Marge Champion Movies

In this Broadway musical (filmed in Los Angeles in front of a live audience), Hal Linden and Lee Remick portray Michael and Agnes, a married couple whose relationship is examined from the night before their wedding, to the day they move out of their family home five decades later. ~ Jason Ankeny, Rovi

Adapted by James Lee Barrett and Liam O'Brien from the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel trilogy by Conrad Richter, The Awakening Land is the story of 27 years (1790 through 1817) in the life of frontierswoman Sayward Luckett Wheeler, played by Elizabeth Montgomery. Amidst the expected hardships and setbacks, emphasis is placed upon the loves in Sayward's life: love of her family, the poverty-stricken Pennsylvania Lucketts; love of her husband, a poetic Massachussetts lawyer known as "The Solitary" (Hal Holbrook); and love and of her land in the Ohio territory. Actress/choreographer Marge Champion, the ex-wife of Awakening Land director Boris Sagal, added immeasurably to the versimilitude of the drama by instructing the actors in the proper speech patterns and body language of the region in which the story takes place. Emmy Award nominations went to actors Montgomery, Holbrook and Jeanette Nolan. This 7-hour miniseries was originally telecast in three parts, on February 19, 20 and 21, 1978. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Queen of the Stardust Ballroom stars Maureen Stapleton as Bea Asher, a woman faced with many new challenges since becoming a widow. She has been afraid for herself and her future since her husband's death, and friends concerned for her well-being take her to the Stardust Ballroom in the hopes that, for one night, she might dance her troubles away. While there, she meets Alvin Green (Charles Durning). They spend the evening dancing and talking and, thanks to his charm and goodness, Bea begins to come out of her sheltered existence. This story was directed for television by Sam O'Steen, who was Mike Nichols' only editor for almost 30 years. ~ Perry Seibert, Rovi

John Cheever's "misery in suburbia" short stories, brief and to the point, have always proven excellent TV fodder. Director Frank Perry's The Swimmer, adapted for the screen by Perry's wife Eleanor, is a rare, and for the most part successful, attempt at offering a Cheever story in feature-length form. Dressed only in swimming trunks throughout the film, Burt Lancaster plays a wealthy, middle-aged advertising man, embarked on a long and revelatory journey through suburban Connecticut. Lancaster slowly makes his way to his split-level home by travelling from house to house, and from swimming pool to swimming pool. At each stop, Lancaster comes face to face with an incident in his past. Informing Kim Hunter that he once harbored a secret love for her, Lancaster is mildly upset by Hunter's indifference. Elderly Cornelia Otis Skinner is incensed at Lancaster's intrusion in her backyard and orders him to leave. At the next home, Lancaster tries to seduce the nubile Janet Landgard, who'd once baby-sat for his daughters, but she runs away in horror. And so it goes: as each subsequent suburbanite peels off his self-protective veneer, Lancaster grows more and more disillusioned with what he thought was his ideal lifestyle. The more intensely painful episode is the confrontation between Lancaster and ex-mistress Janice Rule (this scene was directed, without credit, by Sydney Pollack). Thoroughly defeated, the all-but-naked Lancaster laboriously makes his way through the Connecticut woods in a blinding rainstorm, desperately seeking out his own home where he fully expects his "loving" wife and daughters to greet him. Not this time. Dismissed as too self-consciously "arty" at the time of its release, The Swimmer's reputation increased over the decades following its release thanks to constant late-night TV exposure. The film represents the first movie work of 22-year-old composer Marvin Hamlisch. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Three for the Show is a musical remake of the 1940 comedy Too Many Husbands, which in turn was based on a play by Somerset Maugham. In her next-to-last film, Betty Grable plays Julie, a popular musical comedy stars whose husband Marty (Jack Lemmon) is reported missing in action during WW2. After an appropriate waiting period, Julie makes plans to marry Marty's best friend Vernon (Gower Champion), even though she still carries a torch for her "late" husband. After the wedding, who should show up but Marty, demanding his rights as a husband. At first appalled, Julie eventually begins to enjoy the notion of two husbands. In the original film, the plot was never resolved; in the remake, Marge Champion plays a sidelines character named Gwen, so it's a safe bet that Vernon will lose out to Marty in the Julie sweepstakes. Most of the songs in Three for the Show are old standards, written by such notables as the Gershwin brothers, Gene Austin and Hoagy Carmichael. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

The husband and wife dance team of Marge Champion and Gower Champion are aptly cast as Chuck and Pamela Hubbard, a pair of happily married hoofers, in this musical. The Hubbards have dreamed for years of taking their act to Broadway, and after much hard work and perseverance, they finally get their shot at the big time, only to discover that Pamela is pregnant, and her doctor forbids her to dance. Chuck hires Sybil Meriden (Monica Lewis) to substitute for Pamela in their act, but Pamela begins to wonder if Sybil is taking her place on Chuck's dance card offstage as well as on, while she stays at home with the baby. Everything I Have Is Yours features six songs, including "Derry Down Dilly," "17,000 Telephone Poles," "Serenade for a New Baby," and the title tune. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

The third and (to date) last film version of the Edna Ferber/Jerome Kern/Oscar Hammerstein II musical Show Boat falls just short of greatness but is still a whale of a show. Howard Keel and Kathryn Grayson are in fine fettle as irresponsible gambler Gaylord Ravenal and showboat ingenue Magnolia Hawks. The plot adheres closely to the Broadway original making several welcome improvements in the final act (which was always a bit shaky). Magnolia, daughter of showboat impresario Captain Andy (Joe E. Brown) and Parthy Hawkes (Agnes Moorehead), falls head over heels in love with the raffish Ravenal. When the show's leading lady, Julie (Ava Gardner), and leading man, Steve (Robert Sterling), are forced to leave when Julie's mulatto heritage is revealed by disgruntled suitor Pete (Leif Erickson), Magnolia and Gaylord step into the vacant stage roles and score a hit. Eventually, the two are married and for several months are quite happy. After incurring serious gambling losses, however, Gaylord walks out of Magnolia's life never realizing that his wife is expecting a baby. With the help of her former showboat colleagues Ellie and Frank Schultz (Marge and Gower Champion) and a behind-the-scenes assist from the tragic Julie, Magnolia secures work as a Cabaret singer in Chicago. Her new year's eve debut threatens to be a bust until her father Captain Andy quells the rowdy crowd and guides his daughter through a lovely rendition of After the Ball (a Charles K. Harris tune that pops up in every stage version of Show Boat). Magnolia returns to her family, with her daughter Kim in tow. Upon learning from Julie that he has a daughter, Gaylord returns to Magnolia and Kim, setting the stage for a joyous ending.

Virtually all of the Kern-Hammerstein songs are retained for this version of Show Boat (though none of the songs specially written for the 1936 film version are heard). These cannot be faulted, nor can MGM's sumptuous production values. Still, the 1951 Show Boat leaves one a bit cold. Perhaps it was the removal of the racial themes that gave the original so much substance (as black stevedore Joe, William Warfield exists only to sing a toned-down version Ol' Man River while Joe's wife Queenie is virtually written out of the proceedings). Also, MGM reneged on its original decision to cast Lena Horne as Julie; the role was recast with Ava Gardner and rewritten with an excess of gooey sentiment). Or perhaps it was the production's factory-like slickness; typical of the film's smoothing out of the original property's rough edges was the casting of Marge and Gower Champion, who are just too darn good to be convincing as the doggedly mediocre entertainers Frank and Ellie. Even so, Show Boat does have Howard Keel and Kathryn Grayson at their peak, not to mention the peerless Joe E. Brown as Captain Andy. And the film was a financial success, enabling MGM to bankroll such future musical triumphs as Singin' in the Rain and Seven Brides for Seven Brothers. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

In terms of action, Honor of the West ranks among the best of the Bob Baker westerns. In terms of its script, alas, it must rank as one of the worst. Screenwriter Joseph West (a pseudonym for director George Waggner) seems to have taken a perverse delight in serving up convoluted dialogue that Laurence Olivier might have found impossible to fathom. In one scene, ingenue Marjorie Bell (later known as Marge Champion) delivers a labyrinthine monologue that leaves her literally breathless. Best to turn down the sound and concentrate on the visual aspects of the plot, which deals with sheriff Bob Baker's decision to take off his badge and hunt down his brother's killers without the niceties of the law restraining him. Baker also gets to sing a brace of songs, the best of which is "The Old Chuck Wagon". ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

It was called "Disney's Folly." Who on earth would want to sit still for 90 minutes to watch an animated cartoon? And why pick a well-worn Grimm's Fairy Tale that every schoolkid knows? But Walt Disney seemed to thrive on projects which a lesser man might have written off as "stupid" or "impossible". Investing three years, $1,500,000, and the combined talents of 570 artists into Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Disney produced a film that was not only acknowledged a classic from the outset, but also earned 8,500,000 depression-era dollars in gross rentals. Bypassing early temptations to transform the heroine Snow White into a plump Betty Boop type or a woebegone ZaSu Pitts lookalike, the Disney staffers wisely made radical differentiations between the "straight" and "funny" characters in the story. Thus, Snow White and Prince Charming moved and were drawn realistically, while the Seven Dwarfs were rendered in the rounded, caricatured manner of Disney's short-subject characters. In this way, the serious elements of the story could be propelled forward in a believable enough manner to grab the adult viewers, while the dwarfs provided enough comic and musical hijinks to keep the kids happy. It is a tribute to the genius of the Disney formula that the dramatic and comic elements were strong enough to please both demographic groups. Like any showman, Disney knew the value of genuine horror in maintaining audience interest: accordingly, the Wicked Queen, whose jealousy of Snow White's beauty motivates the story, is a thoroughly fearsome creature even before she transforms herself into an ancient crone. Best of all, Snow White clicks in the three areas in which Disney had always proven superiority over his rivals: Solid story values (any sequence that threatened to slow down the plotline was ruthlessly jettisoned, no matter how much time and money had been spent), vivid etched characterizations (it would have been easier to have all the Dwarfs walk, talk and act alike: thank heaven that Disney never opted for "easy"), and instantly memorable songs (Frank Churchill, Leigh Harline, Paul J. Smith and the entire studio music department was Oscar-nominated for such standards-to-be as "Whistle While You Work" and "Some Day My Prince Will Come"). ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi