Thursday, February 2, 2012

The Katie-Bar-The-Door Awards (1955)

Generally speaking, the phrase "Ingmar Bergman comedy" is the very definition of an oxymoron, but Smiles of a Summer Night is the exception I can recommend to you.

Loosely adapted from Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream, and later to inspire Stephen Sondheim's A Little Night Music and Woody Allen's A Midsummer Night's Sex Comedy, Bergman's Smiles of a Summer Night is the story of tangled relationships—she loves her ex, he loves his bride, she prefers his son, and the maid sleeps with everybody—set right on a long summer evening with the aid of magic wine and moveable beds.

Serve with champagne.

PICTURE (Drama)
winner: The Night Of The Hunter (prod. Paul Gregory)
nominees: Bad Day At Black Rock (prod. Dore Schary); East of Eden (prod. Elia Kazan); Kiss Me Deadly (prod. Robert Aldrich); The Man From Laramie (prod. William Goetz); Rebel Without A Cause (prod. David Weisbart); To Catch A Thief (prod. Alfred Hitchcock)


PICTURE (Comedy/Musical)
winner: The Ladykillers (prod. Michael Balcon)
nominees: Guys And Dolls (prod. Samuel Goldwyn); Lady And The Tramp (prod. Walt Disney); Mister Roberts (prod. Leland Hayward); Oklahoma! (prod. Arthur Hornblow, Jr.); The Seven Year Itch (prod. Charles K. Feldman and Billy Wilder); The Trouble With Harry (prod. Alfred Hitchcock)


PICTURE (Foreign Language)
winner: Pather Panchali (prod. Satyajit Ray)
nominees: Les diaboliques (Diabolique) (prod. Henri-Georges Clouzot); Du rififi chez les hommes (Rififi) (prod. René Bezard, Henri Bérard and Pierre Cabaud); Lola Montès (prod. Albert Caraco); Ordet (prod. Carl Theodor Dreyer, Erik Nielsen and Tage Nielsen); Sommarnattens leende (Smiles of a Summer Night) (prod. Allan Ekelund)


ACTOR (Drama)
winner: James Dean (East of Eden and Rebel Without A Cause)
nominees: Ernest Borgnine (Marty); Cary Grant (To Catch A Thief); Robert Mitchum (The Night Of The Hunter); Laurence Olivier (Richard III); Jean Servais (Du rififi chez les hommes a.k.a. Rififi); Frank Sinatra (The Man With The Golden Arm); James Stewart (The Man From Laramie); Spencer Tracy (Bad Day At Black Rock)


ACTOR (Comedy/Musical)
winner: Gunnar Björnstrand (Sommarnattens leende a.k.a. Smiles of a Summer Night)
nominees: James Cagney (Love Me Or Leave Me and Mister Roberts); Henry Fonda (Mister Roberts); Alec Guinness (The Ladykillers); Gordon MacRae (Oklahoma!)


ACTRESS (Drama)
winner: Anna Magnani (The Rose Tattoo)
nominees: Julie Harris (East of Eden and I Am A Camera); Susan Hayward (I'll Cry Tomorrow); Katharine Hepburn (Summertime); Grace Kelly (To Catch A Thief); Eleanor Parker (Interrupted Melody); Simone Signoret (Les diaboliques a.k.a. Diabolique); Jane Wyman (All That Heaven Allows)


ACTRESS (Comedy/Musical)
winner: Doris Day (Love Me Or Leave Me)
nominees: Eva Dahlbeck (Sommarnattens leende a.k.a. Smiles of a Summer Night); Katie Johnson (The Ladykillers); Shirley MacLaine (The Trouble With Harry); Marilyn Monroe (The Seven Year Itch)


DIRECTOR (Drama)
winner: Satyajit Ray (Pather Panchali)
nominees: Robert Aldrich (Kiss Me Deadly); Henri-Georges Clouzot (Les diaboliques a.k.a. Diabolique); Jules Dassin (Du rififi chez les hommes a.k.a. Rififi); Carl Theodor Dreyer (Ordet); Alfred Hitchcock (To Catch A Thief); Elia Kazan (East of Eden); Charles Laughton (The Night Of The Hunter); Nicholar Ray (Rebel Without A Cause); John Sturges (Bad Day At Black Rock)


DIRECTOR (Comedy/Musical)
winner: Alexander Mackendrick (The Ladykillers)
nominees: Ingmar Bergman (Sommarnattens leende a.k.a. Smiles of a Summer Night); John Ford and Mervyn LeRoy (Mister Roberts); Chuck Jones (One Froggy Evening); Billy Wilder (The Seven Year Itch)


SUPPORTING ACTOR
winner: Robert Ryan (Bad Day At Black Rock)
nominees: Jack Lemmon (Mister Roberts); Sal Mineo (Rebel Without A Cause); Arthur O'Connell (Picnic); Sidney Poitier (Blackboard Jungle)


SUPPORTING ACTRESS
winner: Natalie Wood (Rebel Without A Cause)
nominees: Harriet Andersson (Sommarnattens leende a.k.a. Smiles of a Summer Night); Betsy Blair (Marty); Lillian Gish (The Night Of The Hunter); Mildred Natwick (The Trouble With Harry); Rosalind Russell (Picnic); Susan Strasberg (Picnic); Jo Van Fleet (East of Eden); Shelley Winters (The Night Of The Hunter)


SCREENPLAY
winner: Millard Kaufman (Bad Day At Black Rock)
nominees: William Rose (The Ladykillers); Paddy Chayefsky, from his teleplay (Marty); James Agee, from the novel by Davis Grubb (The Night Of The Hunter); Nicholas Ray, Irving Shulman and Stewart Stern (Rebel Without a Cause); Ingmar Bergman (Sommarnattens leende a.k.a. Smiles of a Summer Night)


SPECIAL AWARDS
One Froggy Evening (Cartoon Short); Stanley Cortez (The Night Of The Hunter) (Cinematography); Hilyard M. Brown and Alfred E. Spencer (The Night Of The Hunter) (Art Direction-Set Decoration)

2 comments:

Maggie said...

'The Night of the Hunter' One of my favorites.

LOL. I scanned this post from my dashboard, before I went to work this morning, but thought it read, Ingrid Bergman. I've been bewildered all day, cause she seemed like a fun person.

Never read before coffee. Ugh.

Mythical Monkey said...

That is funny. Yeah, Ingrid Bergman is a lot of fun -- Indiscreet is a terrific comedy.