Gigi (1958) |
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Gigi Cast |
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Movie Highlights |
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Other InformationAwardsBest Film from any Source Academy Awards [1960] (Won/Nominated: Nominated) Best Written American Musical Writers Guild of America, USA [1959] (Won/Nominated: Won) Top Song Laurel Awards [1959] (Won/Nominated: 2nd place) Top Male Musical Performance Laurel Awards [1959] (Won/Nominated: 2nd place) Top Cinematography - Color Laurel Awards [1959] (Won/Nominated: 2nd place) Top Musical Laurel Awards [1959] (Won/Nominated: Won) Top Female Musical Performance Laurel Awards [1959] (Won/Nominated: Won) Best Soundtrack Album, Dramatic Picture Score or Original Cast Academy Awards [1959] (Won/Nominated: Won) Best Motion Picture Actress - Comedy/Musical Golden Globes [1959] (Won/Nominated: Nominated) Best Motion Picture Actor - Comedy/Musical Golden Globes [1959] (Won/Nominated: Nominated) Best Supporting Actress Golden Globes [1959] (Won/Nominated: Won) Best Motion Picture Director Golden Globes [1959] (Won/Nominated: Won) Best Motion Picture - Musical Golden Globes [1959] (Won/Nominated: Won) Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Motion Pictures Directors Guild of America, USA [1959] (Won/Nominated: Won) Best Foreign Film (Miglior Film Straniero) David di Donatello Awards [1959] (Won/Nominated: Won) Best Writing, Screenplay Based on Material from Another Medium Academy Awards [1959] (Won/Nominated: Won) Best Picture Academy Awards [1959] (Won/Nominated: Won) Best Music, Scoring of a Musical Picture Academy Awards [1959] (Won/Nominated: Won) Best Music, Original Song Academy Awards [1959] (Won/Nominated: Won) Best Film Editing Academy Awards [1959] (Won/Nominated: Won) Best Director Academy Awards [1959] (Won/Nominated: Won) Best Costume Design, Black-and-White or Color Academy Awards [1959] (Won/Nominated: Won) Best Cinematography, Color Academy Awards [1959] (Won/Nominated: Won) Best Art Direction-Set Decoration, Black-and-White or Color Academy Awards [1959] (Won/Nominated: Won) Plot SummaryIn 1900 Paris, Honoré Lachaille, elderly connoisseur of beauty and fashion, strolls through the Bois de Bologne, appreciating the splendor of youth personified by spirited school girl Gigi Alvarez. Later, Honoré meets his elegant nephew Gaston, the ... TaglineThank heaven for Gigi [1966 re-release] The First Lerner-Loewe Musical Since "My Fair Lady" Related MoviesGigi [Version of] (Year of movie: 1925) DiscographySinglesSay a Prayer for Me Tonight I`m Glad I`m Not Young Anymore Gigi Gaston`s Soliloquy I Remember It Well The Night They Invented Champagne Waltz at Maxim`s (She Is Not Thinking of Me) Gossip The Parisians It`s a Bore Thank Heaven for Little Girls |
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Full Cast and Crew |
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Actor CreditsNon Actor Credits |
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Awards |
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Gigi (1958) was nominated for the following awards:
Academy AwardsBAFTA AwardsGolden GlobesLaurel AwardsDirectors Guild of America, USA |
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Fans |
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Trivia |
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Trivia and QuotesTrivia The play Gigi opened at the Fulton Theater on Novemebr 24, 1951 and ran for 219 performances starring Audrey Hepburn. The musical/movie version opened at the Uris Theater on November 13, 1973 and ran for 103 performances.
The duet "I Remember It Well" and Gaston`s soliloquy were actually directed by an uncredited Charles Walters.
Cecil Beaton had to supply over 150 period costumes for the scene in the Bois, and 20 ornate gowns for the scene in Maxims. Beaton had difficulty procuring such a large amount of costumes in Paris but when the production moved to Hollywood, he found warehouses stuffed to bursting with period furniture and costumes.
The cast had to mouth the songs as production was so swift that the score had yet to recorded by the time it came to filming. The biggest money-maker for Vincente Minnelli from his years at MGM. Colette herself discovered who she considered to the ideal actress to play Gigi -- Audrey Hepburn. However, when the film version came to be made, Hepburn was unavailable. The title song was Alan Jay Lerner`s favorite of all his compositions. Also, in his semi-biography, "On the Street Where I Live" Lerner stated that in the song "She is Not Thinking of Me" the line "She`s so ooh-la-la-la, so untrue-la-la-la" was the one line in his career that it took him the longest time to write. The film won all 9 Academy Awards that it was nominated for, more than any other film at that point in Oscar history. That record has since been eclipsed by 1987`s The Last Emperor (1987) (also 9 wins) and 2003`s The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003) (11 wins). Most of the film was shot on location in Paris, with the last few numbers being completed in an apartment that MGM constructed on their backlot.
The entire film was written, cast and ready to shoot in four and a half months.
After Lerner and Loewe had composed a few songs, they took them to Maurice Chevalier who loved them and immediately agreed to star in the film.
Alan Jay Lerner`s usual collaborator, Frederick Loewe, hated working for Hollywood and had vowed not to work on another movie. However, he was sufficiently charmed by the original novel to renege on that promise, albeit under the condition that it be made in France. Lerner and Loewe`s `My Fair Lady` had just opened on Broadway. Its sets and costumes were lavishly praised so Alan Jay Lerner insisted the play`s production designer, Cecil Beaton, should be employed on the film. When the stage production of `My Fair Lady` was trying out in Philadelphia, producer Arthur Freed tackled songwriter Alan Jay Lerner about doing a film musical for him. Lerner had a pre-existing contract with MGM and owed Freed another musical. After reading Colette`s novel, he knew he had found the right material to fulfill that contract.
Jacques Bergerac, playing the skating instructor, did not know how to skate.
`Ina Claire (I)` was offered the role of Aunt Alicia but declined.
The soundtrack album is on the front cover of the Pink Floyd album Ummagumma.
Even though several other musicals had been produced at MGM into the 1960`s, "Gigi" is often referred to as the studio`s last traditional musical, since this motion picture was the final musical production to be filmed under the auspices of the studio`s Arthur Freed Unit, which had been responsible for all of MGM`s classic movie musicals throughout Hollywood`s Golden Era.
With only four letters, this movie has the shortest title of any film to win the Oscar for Best Picture. The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003) is the longest. The cat in the movie reacted violently whenever it was in a scene with Leslie Caron, but director Vincente Minnelli insisted on having that particular cat, so it had to be heavily drugged. This is especially obvious during "Say a Prayer for Me Tonight". The day after the movie won its nine Oscars, M-G-M telephone operators were instructed to answer all phone calls with, "Hello, M-Gigi-M." As described in Minnelli`s autobiography, the film crew wanted to cover the famous mirrored walls in Maxim`s because the camera and spotlights reflected in them, but Minnelli contended that they had to be uncovered since they were the signature of the restaurant. The cinematographer was finally able to work with this by putting suction cups on photo flood lights. Leslie Caron`s singing voice was overdubbed; however, original demo recordings of "Night they Invented Champagne" and "The Way You Look Tonight" sung by Leslie exist and have been released on CD.
Producer Arthur Freed`s interest in the story developed in 1953 after Anita Loos expressed interest in adapting her play as a musical, and after he was able to convince the film industry`s Code Office to view the story as condemning rather than glorifying a system of mistresses. Arthur Freed paid Colette`s widower $125,000 for the musical rights, and bought out Loos` play version for $87,000. Audrey Hepburn was the first choice to play Gigi since she had played the role on stage in 1952, but she was making Funny Face (1957) at the time and declined. Gaston`s walk through Paris while singing "Gigi" uses camera magic to make parts of Paris which are miles apart seem adjacent to each other. This technique, called "creative geography", was created and named by French filmmaker Jean Cocteau Features the song, "Say a Prayer for Me Tonight", which Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe had originally written for the 1956 stage musical "My Fair Lady," but which was deleted during out-of-town tryouts. Lerner was against including the song in "Gigi", but was effectively overruled by Loewe, producer Arthur Freed and director Vincente Minnelli. (The song contains the couplet, "`On to your Waterloo,` whispers my heart./ Pray I`ll be Wellington, not Bonaparte" - arguably an odd sentiment for a French girl to express. In "My Fair Lady", the song was intended for Eliza Doolittle, who was, of course, English.) | ||
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