.gif)
Sunset Boulevard (film)
Encyclopedia
Sunset Boulevard is a 1950 American film noir
directed and co-written by Billy Wilder
, and produced and co-written by Charles Brackett
. It was named after the boulevard
that runs through Los Angeles
and Beverly Hills, California
.
The film stars William Holden
as Joe Gillis, an unsuccessful screenwriter
, Gloria Swanson
as Norma Desmond, a faded silent movie
star who draws him into her fantasy world where she dreams of making a triumphant return to the screen with Erich von Stroheim
as Max Von Mayerling, her butler and ex-husband. Nancy Olson
, Fred Clark
, Lloyd Gough
and Jack Webb
play supporting roles. Director Cecil B. DeMille
and gossip columnist
Hedda Hopper
play themselves, and the film includes cameo appearance
s by leading silent film
actors Buster Keaton
, H. B. Warner
and Anna Q. Nilsson
.
Praised by many critics when first released, Sunset Boulevard was nominated for eleven Academy Awards
and won three. It is widely accepted as a classic, often cited as one of the most noteworthy films of American cinema. Deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" by the U.S. Library of Congress
in 1989, Sunset Boulevard was included in the first group of films selected for preservation in the National Film Registry
. In 1998, it was ranked number twelve on the American Film Institute
's list of the 100 best American films of the 20th century, and in 2007 it was 16th on their 10th Anniversary list.
screenwriter
Joe Gillis (Holden) floats in the swimming pool of long-forgotten silent-film
star Norma Desmond's (Swanson) palatial mansion on Sunset Boulevard
, as Joe narrates, in flashback style, the story of his becoming Desmond's kept man
and the events leading up to his own murder.
Failing to persuade Paramount Pictures
producer
Sheldrake (Clark) to buy his most recent script, Joe tries unsuccessfully to borrow money from his friends after falling behind on his car payments. Fleeing from repossession
men in his car, one of Joe's tires blows out in front of Norma's mansion. Hiding the car in her garage, he tells her he is a writer, and she asks him to help her write a script for a film that she hopes will revive her faded acting career.
With no other options except a low-paying newspaper job in Ohio, Joe agrees to help Norma. He objects when she has Max move his belongings from his apartment to her mansion, but she has paid his overdue rent, so he accepts the situation and begins living at the mansion, first in a room over the garage, then in the mansion itself. As he works on Norma's script, he becomes financially dependent upon her. She lavishes attention on him and buys him expensive clothing, including a tailcoat
for a private New Year's Eve
party attended only by the two of them. Horrified to learn that she has fallen in love with him, he escapes to a party at a friend's house, where he meets Betty Schaefer again. While still unimpressed with most of his work, she believes one scene in one of his scripts has potential. However, Joe leaves the party and returns to the mansion when he hears that Norma has attempted suicide.
After Norma considers her script complete, she sends it to Cecil B. DeMille
at Paramount and waits for his answer. Coincidentally, Gordon Cole, of Paramount's Props Department, begins calling. Thinking he is one of DeMille's underlings, she refuses to speak to him. Eventually, she has Max drive her and Joe to the studio in her Isotta-Fraschini
, a rare vintage luxury car. While DeMille entertains Norma, Joe and Max learn that Cole had called because the studio wants to rent her car and has no interest in her script. Max insists that they hide these facts from her, as he hides the fact that he has faked her recent fan mail.
Meanwhile, Joe has secretly begun to work with Betty on a screenplay, and she falls in love with him. When Norma discovers this, she phones Betty and insinuates what sort of man Joe really is, and Joe invites Betty to the mansion to see for herself. After Betty leaves the mansion, Joe begins packing, having decided to return to Ohio. He ignores Norma's threats to shoot herself, and she shoots him as he leaves, leaving him dead in the pool as in the first scene. By the time the police arrive, she has become lost in fantasy. When she reacts positively to the presence of news cameras, Max convinces her that she is on the set of her new film. Norma dramatically descends her grand staircase, makes a short speech, and delivers the film's most famous line: "All right, Mr. DeMille, I'm ready for my close-up."
has been associated with Hollywood film production since 1911, when the town's first film studio opened there. The film workers lived modestly in the growing neighborhood, but during the 1920s profits and salaries rose to unprecedented levels. With the advent of the star system
, luxurious homes noted for their often incongruous grandeur were built in the area. The stars were the subject of public fascination throughout the world as magazines and newspapers reported the excesses of their lives.
Norma Talmadge
has been described as "the obvious if unacknowledged source of Norma Desmond, the grotesque, predatory silent movie queen of" the film, itself a malignant misrepresentation of Talmadge starring an actress who had been a rival in the 1920s.
As a young man, Billy Wilder
was interested in American culture, with much of his interest fueled by the country's films. In the late 1940s, many of the grand Hollywood houses remained, and Wilder, now a Los Angeles resident, found them to be part of his everyday world. Many former stars from the silent era still lived in them, although most were no longer involved in the film business. Wilder wondered how they spent their time now that "the parade had passed them by," and began imagining the story of a star who had lost her celebrity and box-office appeal.
and Marlon Brando
for the leads, but never approached either with an offer. He contacted Pola Negri
by telephone, but had too much difficulty understanding her heavy Polish accent. They also asked Norma Shearer
if she would portray Norma Desmond, but she rejected the role due to both her retirement and distaste. They had considered having Shearer play Miss Desmond with Fred MacMurray
as her Joe. They approached Greta Garbo
with the role, but she had no interest whatsoever. Wilder and Brackett then visited Mary Pickford
, but before they even discussed the plot with her, Wilder realized she would consider their proposal of a role in which she would have an affair with a man half her age an insult, and they graciously departed. They had considered pairing Mary Pickford
and Montgomery Clift
together to play Norma and Joe.
According to Wilder, he asked George Cukor
for advice, and he suggested Swanson, one of the most feted actresses of the silent-screen era, known for her beauty, talent and extravagant lifestyle. At the peak of her career in 1925, she was said to have received 10,000 fan letters in a single week, and from 1920 until the early 1930s she lived on Sunset Boulevard in an elaborate Italianate palace. In many ways she resembled the Norma Desmond character and, like her, had been unable to make a smooth transition into talking pictures. The similarities ended there, though, as Swanson accepted the end of her film career and in the early 1930s moved to New York City
where she worked in radio
and, from the mid 1940s, in television
. Although Swanson was not seeking a comeback, she was intrigued when Wilder discussed the role with her.
Swanson was chagrined at the notion of submitting to a screen test
, saying she had "made twenty films for Paramount. Why do they want me to audition?" Her reaction was later echoed in the screenplay when Norma Desmond declares, "without me there wouldn't be any Paramount." In her memoir, Swanson recalled asking Cukor if it was unreasonable to refuse the screen test. He replied that Norma Desmond was the role for which she would be remembered. "If they ask you to do ten screen tests, do ten screen tests, or I will personally shoot you," Cukor replied. His enthusiasm convinced Swanson to participate, and she signed a contract for $50,000. In a 1975 interview, Wilder recalled Swanson's reaction with the observation, "There was a lot of Norma in her, you know."
Montgomery Clift was signed to play Joe Gillis for $5,000 per week for a guaranteed twelve weeks, but just before the start of filming he withdrew from the project, claiming his role of a young man involved with an older woman was too close to the one he had played in The Heiress
, in which he felt he had been unconvincing. An infuriated Wilder responded, "If he's any kind of actor, he could be convincing making love to any woman." It has been suggested that the fact that Clift was himself having an affair with a much older woman (the singer Libby Holman
) was his real reason for withdrawing from the film.
Forced to consider the available Paramount stars, Wilder and Brackett focused on William Holden, who had made an impressive debut in Golden Boy in 1939. Following an appearance in Our Town (1940), he served in the military in World War II
, and his return to the screen afterward had been moderately successful. He was enthusiastic about the script and eager to accept the role. He did not know that his salary was $39,000 less than that offered to Clift.
Erich von Stroheim, a leading film director of the 1920s who had actually directed Swanson, was signed to play Max, Norma's faithful servant and protector. For the role of Betty Schaefer, Wilder wanted a newcomer who could project a wholesome and ordinary image to contrast with Swanson's flamboyant and obsessive Desmond. He chose Nancy Olson, who had recently been considered for the role of Delilah
in DeMille's Samson and Delilah
.
, was hired to help develop the storyline after Wilder and Brackett were impressed by a critique he provided of their film The Emperor Waltz
(1948).
In an effort to keep the full details of the story from Paramount Pictures
and avoid the restrictive censorship
of the Breen Code
, they submitted the script a few pages at a time. The Breen Office insisted certain lines be rewritten, such as Gillis's "I'm up that creek and I need a job," which became "I'm over a barrel. I need a job." Paramount executives thought Wilder was adapting a story called A Can of Beans (which did not exist) and allowed him relative freedom to proceed as he saw fit. Only the first third of the script was written when filming began in early May 1949, and Wilder was unsure how the film would end.
The script contains many references to Hollywood and screenwriters, with Joe Gillis making most of the cynical comments. He sums up his film-writing career with the remark, "The last one I wrote was about Okies in the dust bowl. You'd never know, because when it reached the screen, the whole thing played on a torpedo boat." In another exchange, Betty comments to Gillis, "I'd always heard that you had some talent." He replies, "That was last year. This year I'm trying to make a living."
Several of Desmond's lines, such as, "All right Mr. DeMille, I'm ready for my close-up," and "I am big, it's the pictures that got small!" are widely remembered and quoted. Much of the film's wit is delivered through Norma Desmond's deadpan comments, which are often followed by sarcastic retorts from Gillis. Desmond appears to not hear some of these comments, as she is absorbed by her own thoughts and in denial, and so some of Gillis's lines are heard only by the audience, with Wilder blurring the line between the events and Gillis's narration. Gillis's response to Desmond's cry that "the pictures got small" is a muttered reply, "I knew something was wrong with them." Wilder often varies the structure, with Desmond taking Gillis's comments seriously and replying in kind. For example, when the two discuss the overwrought script Desmond has been working on, Gillis observes, "They'll love it in Pomona." "They'll love it everyplace," replies Desmond firmly.
Film writer Richard Corliss
describes Sunset Boulevard as "the definitive Hollywood horror movie," noting that almost everything in the script is "ghoulish." He remarks that the story is narrated by a dead man whom Norma Desmond first mistakes for an undertaker, while most of the film takes place "in an old, dark house that only opens its doors to the living dead." He compares Von Stroheim's character Max with Erik of The Phantom of the Opera, and Norma Desmond with Dracula
, noting that, as she seduces Joe Gillis, the camera tactfully withdraws with "the traditional directorial attitude taken towards Dracula's jugular seductions." He writes that the narrative contains an excess of "cheap sarcasm," but ultimately congratulates the writers for attributing this dialogue to Joe Gillis, who was in any case presented as little more than a hack writer
.
Wilder preferred to leave analysis of his screenplays and films to others. When asked if Sunset Boulevard was a black comedy
, he replied, "No, just a picture."
and the Scottish Symphony Orchestra.
The film's dark, shadowy black-and-white
film noir
cinematography was the work of John F. Seitz
. Wilder had worked with him several times before, and trusted his judgment, allowing him to make his own decisions. Seitz recalled asking Wilder what he required for the pet chimpanzee's funeral scene. Wilder replied, "you know, just your standard monkey funeral shot." For some interior shots, Seitz sprinkled dust in front of the camera before filming to suggest "mustiness," a trick he had also used for Double Indemnity (1944).
Wilder was adamant that the corpse of Joe Gillis be seen from the bottom of the pool, but creating the effect was difficult. The camera was placed inside a specially made box and lowered underwater, but the result disappointed Wilder, who insisted on further experiments. The shot was finally achieved by placing a mirror on the bottom of the pool and filming Holden's reflection from above with the distorted image of the policemen standing around the pool and forming a backdrop.
Film historian Tom Stempel writes, "In both Double Indemnity and Sunset Boulevard, Seitz does something that has always impressed me. Both are films noir, and he finesses the fact that both are set in the sunniest of locales, Los Angeles... he brings together the light and the dark in the same film without any seams showing... he brings together the realistic lighting of Joe Gillis out in the real world with the gothic look of Norma Desmond's mansion. Again with no seams showing."
Edith Head
designed the costumes. Wilder, Head and Swanson agreed that Norma Desmond would have kept somewhat up to date with fashion trends, so Head designed costumes closely resembling the Dior
look of the mid-1940s. Embellishments were added to personalize them and reflect Norma Desmond's taste. Swanson recalled in her biography that the costumes were only "a trifle outdated, a trifle exotic." Head later described her assignment as "the most challenging of my career," and explained her approach with the comment, "Because Norma Desmond was an actress who had become lost in her own imagination, I tried to make her look like she was always impersonating someone." Head later said she relied on Swanson's expertise because "she was creating a past that she knew and I didn't."
Head also designed the costumes for William Holden and the minor characters; but for authenticity, Wilder instructed Von Stroheim and Nancy Olson to wear their own clothing.
The film was scored by Franz Waxman
. His theme for Norma Desmond was based on tango music
, inspired by her having danced the tango with Rudolph Valentino
. This style was contrasted with Joe Gillis's bebop
theme. Waxman also used distorted arrangements of popular film-music styles from the 1920s and 1930s to suggest Norma Desmond's state of mind. The film's soundtrack was released on compact disc
for the first time in 2002.
The overstated decadence of Norma Desmond's home was created by set designer Hans Dreier
, whose career extended back to the silent era. He had also done the interior design for some movie stars' houses, including Mae West's. William Haines
, an interior designer and former actor, later defended criticism of Dreier's set design with the observation, "Bebe Daniels
, Norma Shearer
and Pola Negri
all had homes with ugly interiors like that."
During filming, considerable publicity was given to health-conscious Gloria Swanson's youthful appearance, which did not contrast enough with William Holden's mature looks. Wilder insisted that the age difference be delineated, and instructed makeup supervisor Wally Westmore
to make Swanson look older. Swanson argued that a woman of Norma Desmond's age, with her considerable wealth and devotion to self, would not necessarily look old, and suggested Holden be made up to appear younger. Wilder agreed, and Westmore was assigned this task, which allowed Swanson to portray Norma Desmond as more glamorous figure than Wilder had originally imagined.
, who was murdered in 1922, and his close associate and friend Mabel Normand
, whose career was marked by scandals surrounding the murder.
Swanson was considered a fitting representative of Hollywood's past, remembered nostalgically by older fans but unknown to many younger movie viewers. Her personal collection of photographs decorated the set of Norma Desmond's home, causing Desmond's fictional past to resemble Swanson's authentic career.
The script/film refers to real films such as Gone with the Wind
and real people such as Darryl F. Zanuck
, D. W. Griffith
, Rudolph Valentino
, Douglas Fairbanks
, John Gilbert
, Tyrone Power
, Alan Ladd
, William Demarest
, Adolphe Menjou
, Rod La Rocque
, Vilma Bánky
, Mabel Normand
, Bebe Daniels
, Marie Prevost
, Betty Hutton
, Pearl White
and Barbara Stanwyck
along with the Black Dahlia
murder case. Norma Desmond declares admiration for Greta Garbo
.
Wilder extended his Hollywood references into some of his casting choices. Erich von Stroheim
was a leading director of the silent era. In the role of Max, he watches a film with Norma Desmond, and the briefly shown scene is from Queen Kelly
(1929), which von Stroheim himself directed with Swanson in the title role. Cecil B. De Mille, often credited as the person most responsible for making Swanson a star, plays himself, and was filmed on the set of his current film Samson and Delilah
at Paramount Studios. He calls Norma "young fella," as he had called Swanson, a tiny detail of authenticity suggested by De Mille.
Norma's friends who come to play bridge with her, described in the script as "the waxworks", are Swanson's contemporaries Buster Keaton
, Anna Q. Nilsson
and H. B. Warner
, who, like De Mille, play themselves. Hedda Hopper
also plays herself, reporting on Norma Desmond's downfall in the film's final scenes. (Coincidentally, both Keaton and Hopper would die on February 1, 1966.)
In a comic scene, Norma Desmond performs a pantomime
for Joe Gillis as a Mack Sennett
Bathing Beauty, in homage to Swanson's earliest film roles. She also performs a Charlie Chaplin
impersonation identical to one she performed in the film Manhandled
(1924).
The bed in the shape of a swan that Norma Desmond slept in was actually owned by the dancer Gaby Deslys
, who died in 1920. It had originally been bought by the Universal prop department at auction after Deslys's death. The bed appeared in The Phantom of the Opera
(1925) starring Lon Chaney
.
Wilder also made use of authentic locales. Joe Gillis's home in the Alto Nido apartments is a real apartment block in central Hollywood and was often populated by struggling writers. The scenes of Gillis and Betty Schaefer on Paramount's backlot were filmed on the actual backlot, and the interior of Schwab's Drug Store
was carefully recreated for several scenes. The exterior scenes of the Desmond house were filmed near an old house on Wilshire Blvd.
built during the 1920s, which by 1949 was owned by the former wife of J. Paul Getty
. The house was also featured five years later in Nicholas Ray
's Rebel Without a Cause
. It was later demolished, and an office building now stands in its place.
Wilder and Brackett were nervous about a major screening in Hollywood, and decided to have the preview in Evanston, Illinois
. The original edit opened with a scene inside a morgue
, with the assembled corpses discussing how they came to be there. The story began with the corpse of Joe Gillis recounting his murder to the others. The audience reacted with laughter and seemed unsure whether to view the rest of the film as drama or comedy. After a similar reaction during its second screening, the opening scene was deleted. The new edit was well-received in Poughkeepsie, New York
.
In Hollywood, Paramount arranged a private screening for the various studio heads and specially invited guests. After viewing the film, Barbara Stanwyck
bowed to kiss the hem of Gloria Swanson's skirt. Swanson later remembered looking for Mary Pickford
, only to be told, "She can't show herself, Gloria. She's too overcome. We all are." Louis B. Mayer
berated Wilder before the crowd of celebrities, saying, "You have disgraced the industry that made and fed you! You should be tarred and feathered and run out of Hollywood!" Actress Mae Murray
, a contemporary of Swanson's, was offended by the film and commented, "None of us floozies was that nuts."
Sunset Boulevard attracted a range of positive reviews from critics. Time
described it as a story of "Hollywood at its worst told by Hollywood at its best", while Boxoffice Review wrote "the picture will keep spectators spellbound." James Agee
, writing for Sight and Sound, praised the film and said Wilder and Brackett were "beautifully equipped to do the cold, exact, adroit, sardonic job they have done." Good Housekeeping
described Swanson as a "great lady [who] spans another decade with her magic," while Look
praised her "brilliant and haunting performance."
Some critics accurately foresaw the film's lasting appeal. The Hollywood Reporter
wrote that future generations would "set themselves the task of analyzing the durability and greatness" of the film, while Commonweal
said that in the future "the Library of Congress will be glad to have in its archives a print of Sunset Boulevard."
The rare negative comments included those from The New Yorker
, which described the film as "a pretentious slice of Roquefort," containing only "the germ of a good idea." Thomas M. Pryor wrote for the New York Times that the plot device of using the dead Joe Gillis as narrator was "completely unworthy of Brackett and Wilder, but happily it does not interfere with the success of Sunset Boulevard."
After a seven-week run at Radio City Music Hall
, Variety
magazine reported the film had grossed "around $1,020,000", making it one of that cinema's most successful pictures. Variety also noted that, while it was "breaking records in major cities, it is doing below average in ... the sticks." To promote the film, Gloria Swanson traveled by train throughout the United States, visiting 33 cities in a few months. The publicity helped attract people to the cinemas, but in many provincial areas it was considered less than a hit.
Sunset Boulevards eleven nominations were exceeded only by the fourteen received by All About Eve
, which won six awards, including Best Picture and Best Director. Many critics predicted that the Best Actress award would be given to Gloria Swanson or Bette Davis
for All About Eve and were surprised that the recipient was newcomer Judy Holliday
for Born Yesterday
. Swanson recalled the press' reaction following Holliday's win: "It slowly dawned on me that they were asking for a larger-than-life scene, or better still, a mad scene. More accurately, they were trying to flush out Norma Desmond."
In an interview years later, Davis bluntly stated that she and Swanson had "cancelled each other out," though in 1982 she told Playboy
of her admiration for Swanson's performance, saying, "If she'd won, I'd have shouted hooray. She was sensational, just fantastic."
Sunset Boulevard also received Golden Globe awards for Best Motion Picture – Drama
, Best Motion Picture Actress
(Swanson), Best Motion Picture Director
and Best Motion Picture Score. Wilder and Brackett won a Writers Guild of America, East
Award for Best Written American Drama, while the Directors Guild of America
nominated Wilder for Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Motion Pictures. The National Board of Review
voted it Best Picture
, and Swanson received Best Actress.
American Film Institute
recognition
that he had not anticipated the split, or had ever understood exactly what happened or why. He described it as "an unexpected blow" from which he never recovered fully. When asked to respond to Brackett's comments, Wilder remained silent.
The two men briefly reunited in October 1951 to face charges they had plagiarized
Sunset Boulevard. Former Paramount accountant Stephanie Joan Carlson alleged that in 1947 she had submitted to Wilder and Brackett, at their request, manuscripts of stories, both fictional and based on fact, she had written about studio life. She claimed that one in particular, Past Performance, served as the basis for the Sunset script, and sued the screenwriters and Paramount for $100,000 in general damages
, $250,000 in punitive damages
, $700,000 based on the box office returns, and an additional $350,000 for good measure, for a total of $1,400,000. Carlson's suit was dismissed after two and a half years. In 1954, a similar suit was filed by playwright Edra Buckler, who claimed material she had written had been the screenplay's source. Her suit was dismissed the following year.
Brackett's Hollywood career continued after his split with Wilder. He won an Academy Award for his screenplay for Titanic
(1953), and wrote Niagara (1953), the breakthrough film for Marilyn Monroe
as a dramatic actress. It was Wilder, however, who realized Monroe's comedic abilities in The Seven Year Itch
and Some Like it Hot
. Brackett's career waned by the end of the decade.
William Holden began receiving more important parts and his career rose. In 1953, he won the Best Actor Oscar for Stalag 17
, also directed by Wilder, and by 1956 he was the top box-office attraction in the United States.
Nancy Olson's pairing with William Holden was considered a success, and she appeared opposite him in several films during the 1950s, although none of them repeated their earlier success. She went on to star in The Absent-Minded Professor
(1960) and Son of Flubber
(1961), in which she was paired with Fred MacMurray
, but despite the films' popularity with movie-goers, her career stalled.
Similarly, Gloria Swanson was not able to leverage her own success in Sunset Boulevard. Although offered scripts, she felt that they all were poor imitations of Norma Desmond. Imagining a career that would eventually reduce her to playing "a parody of a parody," she virtually retired from films.
Sunset Boulevard was shown in New York City
in 1960, and drew such a positive response that Paramount arranged for a limited rerelease in theaters throughout the United States. It is arguably best known to modern audiences as a result of its television screenings since the 1960s.
and selected for preservation in the National Film Registry
.
Polls conducted by the American Film Institute
have demonstrated the lasting appeal of Sunset Boulevard and the esteem in which it is held by the modern filmmakers who respond to these polls. In 1998, it was ranked number twelve on a list of "100 Greatest Films". In 2004, two quotes from Sunset Boulevard were included in their poll of "Greatest Movie Quotes": "All right, Mr. De Mille, I'm ready for my close-up" and "I am big, it's the pictures that got small!" at #7 and #24 respectively. In 2005, Franz Waxman's score was named #16 of the top 25 film scores in the AFI's "100 Years of Film Scores" list.
Roger Ebert
has praised the acting of Holden and von Stroheim and has described Swanson's as "one of the all time greatest performances." He says Sunset Boulevard "remains the best drama ever made about the movies because it sees through the illusions." Pauline Kael
described the film as "almost too clever, but at its best in its cleverness," and also wrote that it was common to "hear Billy Wilder called the world's greatest director." When Wilder died, many obituaries
singled out Sunset Boulevard for comment, describing it as one of his most significant works along with Double Indemnity (1944) and Some Like it Hot (1959).
By the late 1990s, most Sunset Boulevard prints were in poor condition, and since the film was one of the last to be filmed on cellulose nitrate
filmstock, much of the original negative had perished. Paramount Studios, believing the film merited the effort of a complete restoration, mounted an expensive project to have it digitally
restored. The restored version was released on DVD
in 2002. A 2003 BBC
review of the restored film described it as "the finest movie ever made about the narcissistic hellhole that is Hollywood."
in Gloria Swanson's role.
(1949), were good-natured and fun. Others, such as What Price Hollywood?
(1932) and A Star Is Born
(1937), hinted at the darker side of Hollywood without explicitly showing it. Sunset Boulevard is considered to be the first to employ such extreme cynicism. It was soon followed by The Bad and the Beautiful
(1952), Singin' in the Rain
(1952) and the musical remake of A Star Is Born
(1954). Though none was as harshly self-critical, each depicted the ease and cruelty with which Hollywood could discard a movie star past his or her prime.
Sunset Boulevard was followed by other films which varied the story of an older actress desperately clinging to her past glory, such as Bette Davis
in The Star (1952) and What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?
(1962), Joan Crawford
in Torch Song
(1953), Geraldine Page
in Sweet Bird of Youth (1962), Susan Hayward
in Valley of the Dolls
(1967) and Faye Dunaway
in Mommie Dearest
(1981). The scenario of an older woman with a gigolo
was also used without the Hollywood setting in such films as Senso
(1954) with Alida Valli
and Farley Granger
and The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone
(1961), which starred Vivien Leigh
and Warren Beatty
, while Katharine Hepburn
's descent into madness in Suddenly, Last Summer
(1959) has been compared to Norma Desmond's final scene. The Day of the Locust
(1975), The Last Tycoon
(1976), and S.O.B. with Julie Andrews
(1981) depict Hollywood in bitter terms and, like Sunset Boulevard, make use of real backstage settings. Rainer Fassbinder's 1982 film Die Sehnsucht der Veronika Voss
also drew heavily from Sunset Boulevard with its subplot of a tragic faded movie star's love affair with a younger man.
Among the more recent films to discuss Sunset Boulevard in their screenplays or imitate its scenes or dialogue are Soapdish
(1991), The Player
(1992), Gods and Monsters
(1998), Mulholland Drive
(2001), Inland Empire
(2006) and Be Cool
(2005). The ending of Cecil B. Demented
(2000) is a parody of Sunset Boulevard's final scene.
(aka Richard Wyler) and cabaret singer/pianist Dickson Hughes on an adaptation titled Boulevard! (at first Starring Norma Desmond). Stapley and Hughes first approached Swanson about appearing in a musical revue they had written, About Time (based on Time
). Swanson stated that she would return to the stage only in a musical version of her comeback film. Within a week, Stapley and Dickson had written three songs which Swanson approved.
In this version, the romance between Gillis and Schaefer was allowed to blossom, and rather than shoot Gillis at the end, Norma gave the couple her blessing, sending them on their way to live "happily ever after."
Although Paramount gave verbal permission to proceed with the musical, there was no formal legal option. In the late 1950s, Paramount withdrew its consent, leading to the demise of the project.
In 1994, Dickson Hughes incorporated material from Boulevard! into a musical Swanson on Sunset, based on his and Stapley's experiences in writing Boulevard!.
and Hal Prince
were working on a musical adaptation with Norma to be played by Angela Lansbury
.
Sondheim gave up the venture after meeting Billy Wilder, who proposed he write an opera instead of a musical. John Kander
and Fred Ebb
were asked to write it. Finally Andrew Lloyd Webber took the opportunity to create a musical.
with music by Andrew Lloyd Webber
and book and lyrics by Don Black and Christopher Hampton
was performed at the 1992 Sydmonton Festival
, before opening in London the following year. It closely followed the film story, retained much of the dialogue and attempted to present similar set designs.
. However, since the film opens with a shot of a street curb which has a stencil of Sunset Blvd in capital letters (instead of a title sequence), the title is sometimes spelled "Sunset Blvd.", for instance by Leonard Maltin
's Film Guide, the IMDb, and the registration with the Library of Congress
.
with Gloria Swanson and William Holden in their original film roles.
Film noir
Film noir is a cinematic term used primarily to describe stylish Hollywood crime dramas, particularly those that emphasize cynical attitudes and sexual motivations. Hollywood's classic film noir period is generally regarded as extending from the early 1940s to the late 1950s...
directed and co-written by Billy Wilder
Billy Wilder
Billy Wilder was an Austro-Hungarian born American filmmaker, screenwriter, producer, artist, and journalist, whose career spanned more than 50 years and 60 films. He is regarded as one of the most brilliant and versatile filmmakers of Hollywood's golden age...
, and produced and co-written by Charles Brackett
Charles Brackett
Charles William Brackett was an American novelist, screenwriter, and film producer.-Biography:Born on November 26, 1892 in Saratoga Springs, New York, Charles William Brackett was the son of New York State Senator, lawyer, and banker Edgar Truman Brackett...
. It was named after the boulevard
Sunset Boulevard
Sunset Boulevard is a street in the western part of Los Angeles County, California, that stretches from Figueroa Street in downtown Los Angeles to the Pacific Coast Highway at the Pacific Ocean in the Pacific Palisades...
that runs through Los Angeles
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
and Beverly Hills, California
Beverly Hills, California
Beverly Hills is an affluent city located in Los Angeles County, California, United States. With a population of 34,109 at the 2010 census, up from 33,784 as of the 2000 census, it is home to numerous Hollywood celebrities. Beverly Hills and the neighboring city of West Hollywood are together...
.
The film stars William Holden
William Holden
William Holden was an American actor. Holden won the Academy Award for Best Actor in 1954 and the Emmy Award for Best Actor in 1974...
as Joe Gillis, an unsuccessful screenwriter
Screenwriter
Screenwriters or scriptwriters or scenario writers are people who write/create the short or feature-length screenplays from which mass media such as films, television programs, Comics or video games are based.-Profession:...
, Gloria Swanson
Gloria Swanson
Gloria Swanson was an American actress, singer and producer. She was one of the most prominent stars during the silent film era as both an actress and a fashion icon, especially under the direction of Cecil B. DeMille, made dozens of silents and was nominated for the first Academy Award in the...
as Norma Desmond, a faded silent movie
Silent Movie
Silent Movie is a 1976 satirical comedy film co-written, directed by, and starring Mel Brooks, and released by 20th Century Fox on June 17, 1976...
star who draws him into her fantasy world where she dreams of making a triumphant return to the screen with Erich von Stroheim
Erich von Stroheim
Erich von Stroheim was an Austrian-born film star of the silent era, subsequently noted as an auteur for his directorial work.-Background:...
as Max Von Mayerling, her butler and ex-husband. Nancy Olson
Nancy Olson
Nancy Ann Olson is an American actress.In Sunset Boulevard she played Betty Schaefer, for which she received an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress...
, Fred Clark
Fred Clark
Frederick Leonard Clark was an American film character actor.-Career:Born in Lincoln, California, Clark made his film debut in 1947 in The Unsuspected. His 20-year film career included almost 70 films, and numerous television appearances...
, Lloyd Gough
Lloyd Gough
Lloyd Gough was an American theater, film, and television actor.Born Michael Gough in New York City, he was a noted character actor...
and Jack Webb
Jack Webb
John Randolph "Jack" Webb , also known by the pseudonym John Randolph, was an American actor, television producer, director and screenwriter, who is most famous for his role as Sergeant Joe Friday in the radio and television series Dragnet...
play supporting roles. Director Cecil B. DeMille
Cecil B. DeMille
Cecil Blount DeMille was an American film director and Academy Award-winning film producer in both silent and sound films. He was renowned for the flamboyance and showmanship of his movies...
and gossip columnist
Gossip columnist
A gossip columnist is someone who writes a gossip column in a newspaper or magazine, especially a gossip magazine. Gossip columns are material written in a light, informal style, which relates the gossip columnist's opinions about the personal lives or conduct of celebrities from show business ,...
Hedda Hopper
Hedda Hopper
Hedda Hopper was an American actress and gossip columnist, whose long-running feud with friend turned arch-rival Louella Parsons became at least as notorious as many of Hopper's columns.-Early life:...
play themselves, and the film includes cameo appearance
Cameo appearance
A cameo role or cameo appearance is a brief appearance of a known person in a work of the performing arts, such as plays, films, video games and television...
s by leading silent film
Silent Movie
Silent Movie is a 1976 satirical comedy film co-written, directed by, and starring Mel Brooks, and released by 20th Century Fox on June 17, 1976...
actors Buster Keaton
Buster Keaton
Joseph Frank "Buster" Keaton was an American comic actor, filmmaker, producer and writer. He was best known for his silent films, in which his trademark was physical comedy with a consistently stoic, deadpan expression, earning him the nickname "The Great Stone Face".Keaton was recognized as the...
, H. B. Warner
H. B. Warner
H. B. Warner was a British actor.-Early life:He was born Henry Byron Charles Stewart Warner-Lickford in St John's Wood, London, England in 1875...
and Anna Q. Nilsson
Anna Q. Nilsson
Anna Quirentia Nilsson was a Swedish born American actress who achieved success in American silent movies.-Background:...
.
Praised by many critics when first released, Sunset Boulevard was nominated for eleven Academy Awards
Academy Awards
An Academy Award, also known as an Oscar, is an accolade bestowed by the American Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to recognize excellence of professionals in the film industry, including directors, actors, and writers...
and won three. It is widely accepted as a classic, often cited as one of the most noteworthy films of American cinema. Deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" by the U.S. Library of Congress
Library of Congress
The Library of Congress is the research library of the United States Congress, de facto national library of the United States, and the oldest federal cultural institution in the United States. Located in three buildings in Washington, D.C., it is the largest library in the world by shelf space and...
in 1989, Sunset Boulevard was included in the first group of films selected for preservation in the National Film Registry
National Film Registry
The National Film Registry is the United States National Film Preservation Board's selection of films for preservation in the Library of Congress. The Board, established by the National Film Preservation Act of 1988, was reauthorized by acts of Congress in 1992, 1996, 2005, and again in October 2008...
. In 1998, it was ranked number twelve on the American Film Institute
American Film Institute
The American Film Institute is an independent non-profit organization created by the National Endowment for the Arts, which was established in 1967 when President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the National Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities Act...
's list of the 100 best American films of the 20th century, and in 2007 it was 16th on their 10th Anniversary list.
Plot
The lifeless body of struggling young HollywoodHollywood, Los Angeles, California
Hollywood is a famous district in Los Angeles, California, United States situated west-northwest of downtown Los Angeles. Due to its fame and cultural identity as the historical center of movie studios and movie stars, the word Hollywood is often used as a metonym of American cinema...
screenwriter
Screenwriter
Screenwriters or scriptwriters or scenario writers are people who write/create the short or feature-length screenplays from which mass media such as films, television programs, Comics or video games are based.-Profession:...
Joe Gillis (Holden) floats in the swimming pool of long-forgotten silent-film
Silent film
A silent film is a film with no synchronized recorded sound, especially with no spoken dialogue. In silent films for entertainment the dialogue is transmitted through muted gestures, pantomime and title cards...
star Norma Desmond's (Swanson) palatial mansion on Sunset Boulevard
Sunset Boulevard
Sunset Boulevard is a street in the western part of Los Angeles County, California, that stretches from Figueroa Street in downtown Los Angeles to the Pacific Coast Highway at the Pacific Ocean in the Pacific Palisades...
, as Joe narrates, in flashback style, the story of his becoming Desmond's kept man
Kept man
A kept man is a man who is financially supported by a wealthy, usually older, person who is neither the man's spouse nor close relative. Men may be kept by either a woman or by another man. Being "kept" could be seen as a form of male prostitution, especially if the relationship has a sexual...
and the events leading up to his own murder.
Failing to persuade Paramount Pictures
Paramount Pictures
Paramount Pictures Corporation is an American film production and distribution company, located at 5555 Melrose Avenue in Hollywood. Founded in 1912 and currently owned by media conglomerate Viacom, it is America's oldest existing film studio; it is also the last major film studio still...
producer
Film producer
A film producer oversees and delivers a film project to all relevant parties while preserving the integrity, voice and vision of the film. They will also often take on some financial risk by using their own money, especially during the pre-production period, before a film is fully financed.The...
Sheldrake (Clark) to buy his most recent script, Joe tries unsuccessfully to borrow money from his friends after falling behind on his car payments. Fleeing from repossession
Repossession
Repossession is generally used to refer to a financial institution taking back an object that was either used as collateral or rented or leased in a transaction. Repossession is a "self-help" type of action in which the party having right of ownership of the property in question takes the property...
men in his car, one of Joe's tires blows out in front of Norma's mansion. Hiding the car in her garage, he tells her he is a writer, and she asks him to help her write a script for a film that she hopes will revive her faded acting career.
With no other options except a low-paying newspaper job in Ohio, Joe agrees to help Norma. He objects when she has Max move his belongings from his apartment to her mansion, but she has paid his overdue rent, so he accepts the situation and begins living at the mansion, first in a room over the garage, then in the mansion itself. As he works on Norma's script, he becomes financially dependent upon her. She lavishes attention on him and buys him expensive clothing, including a tailcoat
Tailcoat
A tailcoat is a coat with the front of the skirt cut away, so as to leave only the rear section of the skirt, known as the tails. The historical reason coats were cut this way was to make it easier for the wearer to ride a horse, but over the years tailcoats of varying types have evolved into forms...
for a private New Year's Eve
New Year's Eve
New Year's Eve is observed annually on December 31, the final day of any given year in the Gregorian calendar. In modern societies, New Year's Eve is often celebrated at social gatherings, during which participants dance, eat, consume alcoholic beverages, and watch or light fireworks to mark the...
party attended only by the two of them. Horrified to learn that she has fallen in love with him, he escapes to a party at a friend's house, where he meets Betty Schaefer again. While still unimpressed with most of his work, she believes one scene in one of his scripts has potential. However, Joe leaves the party and returns to the mansion when he hears that Norma has attempted suicide.
After Norma considers her script complete, she sends it to Cecil B. DeMille
Cecil B. DeMille
Cecil Blount DeMille was an American film director and Academy Award-winning film producer in both silent and sound films. He was renowned for the flamboyance and showmanship of his movies...
at Paramount and waits for his answer. Coincidentally, Gordon Cole, of Paramount's Props Department, begins calling. Thinking he is one of DeMille's underlings, she refuses to speak to him. Eventually, she has Max drive her and Joe to the studio in her Isotta-Fraschini
Isotta-Fraschini
Isotta Fraschini represents two Italian manufacturing companies which produce, respectively, marine engines and luxury goods. In the early 20th century it was famous worldwide as a luxury car manufacturer.-History:...
, a rare vintage luxury car. While DeMille entertains Norma, Joe and Max learn that Cole had called because the studio wants to rent her car and has no interest in her script. Max insists that they hide these facts from her, as he hides the fact that he has faked her recent fan mail.
Meanwhile, Joe has secretly begun to work with Betty on a screenplay, and she falls in love with him. When Norma discovers this, she phones Betty and insinuates what sort of man Joe really is, and Joe invites Betty to the mansion to see for herself. After Betty leaves the mansion, Joe begins packing, having decided to return to Ohio. He ignores Norma's threats to shoot herself, and she shoots him as he leaves, leaving him dead in the pool as in the first scene. By the time the police arrive, she has become lost in fantasy. When she reacts positively to the presence of news cameras, Max convinces her that she is on the set of her new film. Norma dramatically descends her grand staircase, makes a short speech, and delivers the film's most famous line: "All right, Mr. DeMille, I'm ready for my close-up."
Background
The street Sunset BoulevardSunset Boulevard
Sunset Boulevard is a street in the western part of Los Angeles County, California, that stretches from Figueroa Street in downtown Los Angeles to the Pacific Coast Highway at the Pacific Ocean in the Pacific Palisades...
has been associated with Hollywood film production since 1911, when the town's first film studio opened there. The film workers lived modestly in the growing neighborhood, but during the 1920s profits and salaries rose to unprecedented levels. With the advent of the star system
Star system (film)
The star system was the method of creating, promoting and exploiting movie stars in Classical Hollywood cinema. Studios would select promising young actors and glamorise and create personas for them, often inventing new names and even new backgrounds...
, luxurious homes noted for their often incongruous grandeur were built in the area. The stars were the subject of public fascination throughout the world as magazines and newspapers reported the excesses of their lives.
Norma Talmadge
Norma Talmadge
Norma Talmadge was an American actress and film producer of the silent era. A major box office draw for more than a decade, her career reached a peak in the early 1920s, when she ranked among the most popular idols of the American screen.Her most famous film was Smilin’ Through , but she also...
has been described as "the obvious if unacknowledged source of Norma Desmond, the grotesque, predatory silent movie queen of" the film, itself a malignant misrepresentation of Talmadge starring an actress who had been a rival in the 1920s.
As a young man, Billy Wilder
Billy Wilder
Billy Wilder was an Austro-Hungarian born American filmmaker, screenwriter, producer, artist, and journalist, whose career spanned more than 50 years and 60 films. He is regarded as one of the most brilliant and versatile filmmakers of Hollywood's golden age...
was interested in American culture, with much of his interest fueled by the country's films. In the late 1940s, many of the grand Hollywood houses remained, and Wilder, now a Los Angeles resident, found them to be part of his everyday world. Many former stars from the silent era still lived in them, although most were no longer involved in the film business. Wilder wondered how they spent their time now that "the parade had passed them by," and began imagining the story of a star who had lost her celebrity and box-office appeal.
Casting
Principal cast
| Actor | Role |
|---|---|
| William Holden William Holden William Holden was an American actor. Holden won the Academy Award for Best Actor in 1954 and the Emmy Award for Best Actor in 1974... |
Joseph C. "Joe" Gillis |
| Gloria Swanson Gloria Swanson Gloria Swanson was an American actress, singer and producer. She was one of the most prominent stars during the silent film era as both an actress and a fashion icon, especially under the direction of Cecil B. DeMille, made dozens of silents and was nominated for the first Academy Award in the... |
Norma Desmond |
| Erich von Stroheim Erich von Stroheim Erich von Stroheim was an Austrian-born film star of the silent era, subsequently noted as an auteur for his directorial work.-Background:... |
Maximillian "Max" von Mayerling |
| Nancy Olson Nancy Olson Nancy Ann Olson is an American actress.In Sunset Boulevard she played Betty Schaefer, for which she received an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress... |
Betty Schaefer |
| Fred Clark Fred Clark Frederick Leonard Clark was an American film character actor.-Career:Born in Lincoln, California, Clark made his film debut in 1947 in The Unsuspected. His 20-year film career included almost 70 films, and numerous television appearances... |
Sheldrake |
| Lloyd Gough Lloyd Gough Lloyd Gough was an American theater, film, and television actor.Born Michael Gough in New York City, he was a noted character actor... |
Marino |
| Jack Webb Jack Webb John Randolph "Jack" Webb , also known by the pseudonym John Randolph, was an American actor, television producer, director and screenwriter, who is most famous for his role as Sergeant Joe Friday in the radio and television series Dragnet... |
Arthur "Artie" Green |
| Franklyn Farnum Franklyn Farnum William Smith , better known by his screen name, Franklyn Farnum, was an American character actor and Hollywood extra who appeared in 433 productions between the years 1916 and 1961.... |
Undertaker |
| Larry J. Blake | Finance man #1 |
| Charles Dayton | Finance man #2 |
| Cecil B. DeMille Cecil B. DeMille Cecil Blount DeMille was an American film director and Academy Award-winning film producer in both silent and sound films. He was renowned for the flamboyance and showmanship of his movies... |
Himself |
| Hedda Hopper Hedda Hopper Hedda Hopper was an American actress and gossip columnist, whose long-running feud with friend turned arch-rival Louella Parsons became at least as notorious as many of Hopper's columns.-Early life:... |
Herself |
| Buster Keaton Buster Keaton Joseph Frank "Buster" Keaton was an American comic actor, filmmaker, producer and writer. He was best known for his silent films, in which his trademark was physical comedy with a consistently stoic, deadpan expression, earning him the nickname "The Great Stone Face".Keaton was recognized as the... |
Himself |
| Anna Q. Nilsson Anna Q. Nilsson Anna Quirentia Nilsson was a Swedish born American actress who achieved success in American silent movies.-Background:... |
Herself |
| H. B. Warner H. B. Warner H. B. Warner was a British actor.-Early life:He was born Henry Byron Charles Stewart Warner-Lickford in St John's Wood, London, England in 1875... |
Himself |
| Ray Evans Ray Evans Raymond Bernard Evans was an American songwriter. He was a partner in a composing and songwriting duo with Jay Livingston, known for the songs they composed for films... |
Himself |
| Jay Livingston Jay Livingston Jay Livingston was an American composer and singer best known as half of a songwriting duo with Ray Evans that specialized in songs composed for films. Livingston wrote the music and Evans the lyrics.... |
Himself |
Cast selection
According to Brackett, he and Wilder never considered anyone except Gloria Swanson for the role of Norma Desmond. Wilder, however, had a different recollection. He recalled first wanting Mae WestMae West
Mae West was an American actress, playwright, screenwriter and sex symbol whose entertainment career spanned seven decades....
and Marlon Brando
Marlon Brando
Marlon Brando, Jr. was an American movie star and political activist. "Unchallenged as the most important actor in modern American Cinema" according to the St...
for the leads, but never approached either with an offer. He contacted Pola Negri
Pola Negri
Pola Negri was a Polish stage and film actress who achieved worldwide fame for her tragedienne and femme fatale roles from the 1910s through the 1940s during the Golden Era of Hollywood film. She was the first European film star to be invited to Hollywood, and became a great American star. She...
by telephone, but had too much difficulty understanding her heavy Polish accent. They also asked Norma Shearer
Norma Shearer
Edith Norma Shearer was a Canadian-American actress. Shearer was one of the most popular actresses in North America from the mid-1920s through the 1930s...
if she would portray Norma Desmond, but she rejected the role due to both her retirement and distaste. They had considered having Shearer play Miss Desmond with Fred MacMurray
Fred MacMurray
Frederick Martin "Fred" MacMurray was an American actor who appeared in more than 100 movies and a successful television series during a career that spanned nearly a half-century, from 1930 to the 1970s....
as her Joe. They approached Greta Garbo
Greta Garbo
Greta Garbo , born Greta Lovisa Gustafsson, was a Swedish film actress. Garbo was an international star and icon during Hollywood's silent and classic periods. Many of Garbo's films were sensational hits, and all but three were profitable...
with the role, but she had no interest whatsoever. Wilder and Brackett then visited Mary Pickford
Mary Pickford
Mary Pickford was a Canadian-born motion picture actress, co-founder of the film studio United Artists and one of the original 36 founders of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences...
, but before they even discussed the plot with her, Wilder realized she would consider their proposal of a role in which she would have an affair with a man half her age an insult, and they graciously departed. They had considered pairing Mary Pickford
Mary Pickford
Mary Pickford was a Canadian-born motion picture actress, co-founder of the film studio United Artists and one of the original 36 founders of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences...
and Montgomery Clift
Montgomery Clift
Edward Montgomery Clift was an American film and stage actor. The New York Times’ obituary noted his portrayal of "moody, sensitive young men"....
together to play Norma and Joe.
According to Wilder, he asked George Cukor
George Cukor
George Dewey Cukor was an American film director. He mainly concentrated on comedies and literary adaptations. His career flourished at RKO and later MGM, where he directed What Price Hollywood? , A Bill of Divorcement , Dinner at Eight , Little Women , David Copperfield , Romeo and Juliet and...
for advice, and he suggested Swanson, one of the most feted actresses of the silent-screen era, known for her beauty, talent and extravagant lifestyle. At the peak of her career in 1925, she was said to have received 10,000 fan letters in a single week, and from 1920 until the early 1930s she lived on Sunset Boulevard in an elaborate Italianate palace. In many ways she resembled the Norma Desmond character and, like her, had been unable to make a smooth transition into talking pictures. The similarities ended there, though, as Swanson accepted the end of her film career and in the early 1930s moved to New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
where she worked in radio
Radio
Radio is the transmission of signals through free space by modulation of electromagnetic waves with frequencies below those of visible light. Electromagnetic radiation travels by means of oscillating electromagnetic fields that pass through the air and the vacuum of space...
and, from the mid 1940s, in television
Television
Television is a telecommunication medium for transmitting and receiving moving images that can be monochrome or colored, with accompanying sound...
. Although Swanson was not seeking a comeback, she was intrigued when Wilder discussed the role with her.
Swanson was chagrined at the notion of submitting to a screen test
Screen test
A screen test is a method of determining the suitability of an actor or actress for performing on film and/or in a particular role. The performer is generally given a scene, or selected lines and actions, and instructed to perform in front of a camera to see if they are suitable...
, saying she had "made twenty films for Paramount. Why do they want me to audition?" Her reaction was later echoed in the screenplay when Norma Desmond declares, "without me there wouldn't be any Paramount." In her memoir, Swanson recalled asking Cukor if it was unreasonable to refuse the screen test. He replied that Norma Desmond was the role for which she would be remembered. "If they ask you to do ten screen tests, do ten screen tests, or I will personally shoot you," Cukor replied. His enthusiasm convinced Swanson to participate, and she signed a contract for $50,000. In a 1975 interview, Wilder recalled Swanson's reaction with the observation, "There was a lot of Norma in her, you know."
Montgomery Clift was signed to play Joe Gillis for $5,000 per week for a guaranteed twelve weeks, but just before the start of filming he withdrew from the project, claiming his role of a young man involved with an older woman was too close to the one he had played in The Heiress
The Heiress
The Heiress is a 1949 American drama film. It was written by Ruth and Augustus Goetz, adapted from their 1947 play of the same title that was based on the 1880 novel Washington Square by Henry James. The film was directed by William Wyler, with starring performances by Olivia de Havilland as...
, in which he felt he had been unconvincing. An infuriated Wilder responded, "If he's any kind of actor, he could be convincing making love to any woman." It has been suggested that the fact that Clift was himself having an affair with a much older woman (the singer Libby Holman
Libby Holman
Libby Holman was an American torch singer and stage actress who also achieved notoriety for her complex and unconventional personal life.-Early life:...
) was his real reason for withdrawing from the film.
Forced to consider the available Paramount stars, Wilder and Brackett focused on William Holden, who had made an impressive debut in Golden Boy in 1939. Following an appearance in Our Town (1940), he served in the military in World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, and his return to the screen afterward had been moderately successful. He was enthusiastic about the script and eager to accept the role. He did not know that his salary was $39,000 less than that offered to Clift.
Erich von Stroheim, a leading film director of the 1920s who had actually directed Swanson, was signed to play Max, Norma's faithful servant and protector. For the role of Betty Schaefer, Wilder wanted a newcomer who could project a wholesome and ordinary image to contrast with Swanson's flamboyant and obsessive Desmond. He chose Nancy Olson, who had recently been considered for the role of Delilah
Delilah
Delilah appears only in the Hebrew bible Book of Judges 16, where she is the "woman in the valley of Sorek" whom Samson loved, and who was his downfall...
in DeMille's Samson and Delilah
Samson and Delilah (1949 film)
Samson and Delilah is a 1949 film made by Paramount Pictures , produced and directed by Cecil B. DeMille and starring Victor Mature and Hedy Lamarr as the title characters...
.
Writing
Wilder and Brackett began working on a script in 1948, but the result did not completely satisfy them. In August 1948 D.M. Marshman Jr., formerly a writer for LifeLife (magazine)
Life generally refers to three American magazines:*A humor and general interest magazine published from 1883 to 1936. Time founder Henry Luce bought the magazine in 1936 solely so that he could acquire the rights to its name....
, was hired to help develop the storyline after Wilder and Brackett were impressed by a critique he provided of their film The Emperor Waltz
The Emperor Waltz
The Emperor Waltz is a 1948 American musical film directed by Billy Wilder. The screenplay by Wilder and Charles Brackett was inspired by a real-life incident involving Franz Joseph I of Austria.- Plot :...
(1948).
In an effort to keep the full details of the story from Paramount Pictures
Paramount Pictures
Paramount Pictures Corporation is an American film production and distribution company, located at 5555 Melrose Avenue in Hollywood. Founded in 1912 and currently owned by media conglomerate Viacom, it is America's oldest existing film studio; it is also the last major film studio still...
and avoid the restrictive censorship
Censorship
thumb|[[Book burning]] following the [[1973 Chilean coup d'état|1973 coup]] that installed the [[Military government of Chile |Pinochet regime]] in Chile...
of the Breen Code
Production Code
The Motion Picture Production Code was the set of industry moral censorship guidelines that governed the production of the vast majority of United States motion pictures released by major studios from 1930 to 1968. It is also popularly known as the Hays Code, after Hollywood's chief censor of the...
, they submitted the script a few pages at a time. The Breen Office insisted certain lines be rewritten, such as Gillis's "I'm up that creek and I need a job," which became "I'm over a barrel. I need a job." Paramount executives thought Wilder was adapting a story called A Can of Beans (which did not exist) and allowed him relative freedom to proceed as he saw fit. Only the first third of the script was written when filming began in early May 1949, and Wilder was unsure how the film would end.
The script contains many references to Hollywood and screenwriters, with Joe Gillis making most of the cynical comments. He sums up his film-writing career with the remark, "The last one I wrote was about Okies in the dust bowl. You'd never know, because when it reached the screen, the whole thing played on a torpedo boat." In another exchange, Betty comments to Gillis, "I'd always heard that you had some talent." He replies, "That was last year. This year I'm trying to make a living."
The fusion of writer-director Billy Wilder's biting humor and the classic elements of film noir make for a strange kind of comedy, as well as a strange kind of film noir. There are no belly laughs here, but there are certainly strangled giggles: at the pet chimp's midnight funeral, at Joe's discomfited acquiescence to the role of gigolo; at Norma's Mack Sennett-style "entertainments" for her uneasy lover; and at the ritualized solemnity of Norma's "waxworks" card parties, which feature such former luminaries as Buster Keaton as Norma's has-been cronies.
Several of Desmond's lines, such as, "All right Mr. DeMille, I'm ready for my close-up," and "I am big, it's the pictures that got small!" are widely remembered and quoted. Much of the film's wit is delivered through Norma Desmond's deadpan comments, which are often followed by sarcastic retorts from Gillis. Desmond appears to not hear some of these comments, as she is absorbed by her own thoughts and in denial, and so some of Gillis's lines are heard only by the audience, with Wilder blurring the line between the events and Gillis's narration. Gillis's response to Desmond's cry that "the pictures got small" is a muttered reply, "I knew something was wrong with them." Wilder often varies the structure, with Desmond taking Gillis's comments seriously and replying in kind. For example, when the two discuss the overwrought script Desmond has been working on, Gillis observes, "They'll love it in Pomona." "They'll love it everyplace," replies Desmond firmly.
Film writer Richard Corliss
Richard Corliss
Richard Nelson Corliss is a writer for Time magazine who focuses on movies, with the occasional article on music or sports. Corliss is the former editor-in-chief of Film Comment...
describes Sunset Boulevard as "the definitive Hollywood horror movie," noting that almost everything in the script is "ghoulish." He remarks that the story is narrated by a dead man whom Norma Desmond first mistakes for an undertaker, while most of the film takes place "in an old, dark house that only opens its doors to the living dead." He compares Von Stroheim's character Max with Erik of The Phantom of the Opera, and Norma Desmond with Dracula
Count Dracula
Count Dracula is a fictional character, the titular antagonist of Bram Stoker's 1897 Gothic horror novel Dracula and archetypal vampire. Some aspects of his character have been inspired by the 15th century Romanian general and Wallachian Prince Vlad III the Impaler...
, noting that, as she seduces Joe Gillis, the camera tactfully withdraws with "the traditional directorial attitude taken towards Dracula's jugular seductions." He writes that the narrative contains an excess of "cheap sarcasm," but ultimately congratulates the writers for attributing this dialogue to Joe Gillis, who was in any case presented as little more than a hack writer
Hack writer
Hack writer is a colloquial and usually pejorative term used to refer to a writer who is paid to write low-quality, rushed articles or books "to order", often with a short deadline. In a fiction-writing context, the term is used to describe writers who are paid to churn out sensational,...
.
Wilder preferred to leave analysis of his screenplays and films to others. When asked if Sunset Boulevard was a black comedy
Black comedy
A black comedy, or dark comedy, is a comic work that employs black humor or gallows humor. The definition of black humor is problematic; it has been argued that it corresponds to the earlier concept of gallows humor; and that, as humor has been defined since Freud as a comedic act that anesthetizes...
, he replied, "No, just a picture."
Score
The score was composed by Franz Waxman. In 2002 a CD was published of the score re-recorded by Joel McNeelyJoel McNeely
-Biography:Joel McNeely was born in Madison, Wisconsin. Both of his parents were involved in music and theater, and as a child he played the piano, saxophone, bass, and flute...
and the Scottish Symphony Orchestra.
Key creative personnel
Black-and-white
Black-and-white, often abbreviated B/W or B&W, is a term referring to a number of monochrome forms in visual arts.Black-and-white as a description is also something of a misnomer, for in addition to black and white, most of these media included varying shades of gray...
film noir
Film noir
Film noir is a cinematic term used primarily to describe stylish Hollywood crime dramas, particularly those that emphasize cynical attitudes and sexual motivations. Hollywood's classic film noir period is generally regarded as extending from the early 1940s to the late 1950s...
cinematography was the work of John F. Seitz
John F. Seitz
John Francis Seitz, A.S.C. was an American cinematographer and inventor.He was nominated for seven Academy Awards.-Career:...
. Wilder had worked with him several times before, and trusted his judgment, allowing him to make his own decisions. Seitz recalled asking Wilder what he required for the pet chimpanzee's funeral scene. Wilder replied, "you know, just your standard monkey funeral shot." For some interior shots, Seitz sprinkled dust in front of the camera before filming to suggest "mustiness," a trick he had also used for Double Indemnity (1944).
Wilder was adamant that the corpse of Joe Gillis be seen from the bottom of the pool, but creating the effect was difficult. The camera was placed inside a specially made box and lowered underwater, but the result disappointed Wilder, who insisted on further experiments. The shot was finally achieved by placing a mirror on the bottom of the pool and filming Holden's reflection from above with the distorted image of the policemen standing around the pool and forming a backdrop.
Film historian Tom Stempel writes, "In both Double Indemnity and Sunset Boulevard, Seitz does something that has always impressed me. Both are films noir, and he finesses the fact that both are set in the sunniest of locales, Los Angeles... he brings together the light and the dark in the same film without any seams showing... he brings together the realistic lighting of Joe Gillis out in the real world with the gothic look of Norma Desmond's mansion. Again with no seams showing."
Edith Head
Edith Head was an American costume designer who won eight Academy Awards, more than any other woman.-Early life and career:...
designed the costumes. Wilder, Head and Swanson agreed that Norma Desmond would have kept somewhat up to date with fashion trends, so Head designed costumes closely resembling the Dior
Christian Dior
Christian Dior , was a French fashion designer, best known as the founder of one of the world's top fashion houses, also called Christian Dior.-Life:...
look of the mid-1940s. Embellishments were added to personalize them and reflect Norma Desmond's taste. Swanson recalled in her biography that the costumes were only "a trifle outdated, a trifle exotic." Head later described her assignment as "the most challenging of my career," and explained her approach with the comment, "Because Norma Desmond was an actress who had become lost in her own imagination, I tried to make her look like she was always impersonating someone." Head later said she relied on Swanson's expertise because "she was creating a past that she knew and I didn't."
Head also designed the costumes for William Holden and the minor characters; but for authenticity, Wilder instructed Von Stroheim and Nancy Olson to wear their own clothing.
The film was scored by Franz Waxman
Franz Waxman
Franz Waxman was a German-American composer, known for his bravura Carmen Fantasie for violin and orchestra, based on musical themes from the Bizet opera Carmen, and for his musical scores for films....
. His theme for Norma Desmond was based on tango music
Tango music
Tango is a style of ballroom dance music in 2/4 or 4/4 time that originated among European immigrant populations of Argentina and Uruguay . It is traditionally played by a sextet, known as the orquesta típica, which includes two violins, piano, double bass, and two bandoneons...
, inspired by her having danced the tango with Rudolph Valentino
Rudolph Valentino
Rudolph Valentino was an Italian actor, and early pop icon. A sex symbol of the 1920s, Valentino was known as the "Latin Lover". He starred in several well-known silent films including The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, The Sheik, Blood and Sand, The Eagle and Son of the Sheik...
. This style was contrasted with Joe Gillis's bebop
Bebop
Bebop differed drastically from the straightforward compositions of the swing era, and was instead characterized by fast tempos, asymmetrical phrasing, intricate melodies, and rhythm sections that expanded on their role as tempo-keepers...
theme. Waxman also used distorted arrangements of popular film-music styles from the 1920s and 1930s to suggest Norma Desmond's state of mind. The film's soundtrack was released on compact disc
Compact Disc
The Compact Disc is an optical disc used to store digital data. It was originally developed to store and playback sound recordings exclusively, but later expanded to encompass data storage , write-once audio and data storage , rewritable media , Video Compact Discs , Super Video Compact Discs ,...
for the first time in 2002.
The overstated decadence of Norma Desmond's home was created by set designer Hans Dreier
Hans Dreier
Hans Dreier was a film art director.Born in Bremen, Germany, Dreier began his career in German film in 1919 and by the end of the 1920s had relocated to Hollywood....
, whose career extended back to the silent era. He had also done the interior design for some movie stars' houses, including Mae West's. William Haines
William Haines
Charles William "Billy" Haines was an American film actor and interior designer. He was a star of the silent era until the 1930s, when Haines' career was cut short by MGM Studios due to his refusal to deny his homosexuality...
, an interior designer and former actor, later defended criticism of Dreier's set design with the observation, "Bebe Daniels
Bebe Daniels
Bebe Daniels was an American actress, singer, dancer, writer and producer. She began her career in Hollywood during the silent movie era as a child actress, became a star in musicals like 42nd Street, and later gained further fame on radio and television in Britain...
, Norma Shearer
Norma Shearer
Edith Norma Shearer was a Canadian-American actress. Shearer was one of the most popular actresses in North America from the mid-1920s through the 1930s...
and Pola Negri
Pola Negri
Pola Negri was a Polish stage and film actress who achieved worldwide fame for her tragedienne and femme fatale roles from the 1910s through the 1940s during the Golden Era of Hollywood film. She was the first European film star to be invited to Hollywood, and became a great American star. She...
all had homes with ugly interiors like that."
During filming, considerable publicity was given to health-conscious Gloria Swanson's youthful appearance, which did not contrast enough with William Holden's mature looks. Wilder insisted that the age difference be delineated, and instructed makeup supervisor Wally Westmore
Wally Westmore
Walter 'Wally' James Westmore was a make-up artist for Hollywood films....
to make Swanson look older. Swanson argued that a woman of Norma Desmond's age, with her considerable wealth and devotion to self, would not necessarily look old, and suggested Holden be made up to appear younger. Wilder agreed, and Westmore was assigned this task, which allowed Swanson to portray Norma Desmond as more glamorous figure than Wilder had originally imagined.
Touches of authenticity
In dissecting Hollywood's "world of illusion," Wilder carefully placed the story within as authentic a setting as possible and made use of Hollywood history. Norma Desmond's name is believed to have been inspired by actor/director William Desmond TaylorWilliam Desmond Taylor
William Desmond Taylor was an Irish-born American actor, successful film director of silent movies and a popular figure in the growing Hollywood film colony of the 1910s and early 1920s...
, who was murdered in 1922, and his close associate and friend Mabel Normand
Mabel Normand
Mabel Normand was an American silent film comedienne and actress. She was a popular star of Mack Sennett's Keystone Studios and is noted as one of the film industry's first female screenwriters, producers and directors...
, whose career was marked by scandals surrounding the murder.
Swanson was considered a fitting representative of Hollywood's past, remembered nostalgically by older fans but unknown to many younger movie viewers. Her personal collection of photographs decorated the set of Norma Desmond's home, causing Desmond's fictional past to resemble Swanson's authentic career.
The script/film refers to real films such as Gone with the Wind
Gone with the Wind (film)
Gone with the Wind is a 1939 American historical epic film adapted from Margaret Mitchell's Pulitzer-winning 1936 novel of the same name. It was produced by David O. Selznick and directed by Victor Fleming from a screenplay by Sidney Howard...
and real people such as Darryl F. Zanuck
Darryl F. Zanuck
Darryl Francis Zanuck was an American producer, writer, actor, director and studio executive who played a major part in the Hollywood studio system as one of its longest survivors...
, D. W. Griffith
D. W. Griffith
David Llewelyn Wark Griffith was a premier pioneering American film director. He is best known as the director of the controversial and groundbreaking 1915 film The Birth of a Nation and the subsequent film Intolerance .Griffith's film The Birth of a Nation made pioneering use of advanced camera...
, Rudolph Valentino
Rudolph Valentino
Rudolph Valentino was an Italian actor, and early pop icon. A sex symbol of the 1920s, Valentino was known as the "Latin Lover". He starred in several well-known silent films including The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, The Sheik, Blood and Sand, The Eagle and Son of the Sheik...
, Douglas Fairbanks
Douglas Fairbanks
Douglas Fairbanks, Sr. was an American actor, screenwriter, director and producer. He was best known for his swashbuckling roles in silent films such as The Thief of Bagdad, Robin Hood, and The Mark of Zorro....
, John Gilbert
John Gilbert (actor)
John Gilbert was an American actor and a major star of the silent film era.Known as "the great lover," he rivaled even Rudolph Valentino as a box office draw...
, Tyrone Power
Tyrone Power
Tyrone Edmund Power, Jr. , usually credited as Tyrone Power and known sometimes as Ty Power, was an American film and stage actor who appeared in dozens of films from the 1930s to the 1950s, often in swashbuckler roles or romantic leads such as in The Mark of Zorro, Blood and Sand, The Black Swan,...
, Alan Ladd
Alan Ladd
-Early life:Ladd was born in Hot Springs, Arkansas. He was the only child of Ina Raleigh Ladd and Alan Ladd, Sr. He was of English ancestry. His father died when he was four, and his mother relocated to Oklahoma City where she married Jim Beavers, a housepainter...
, William Demarest
William Demarest
Carl William Demarest was an American character actor. He frequently played crusty but good-hearted roles.-Early life and career:...
, Adolphe Menjou
Adolphe Menjou
Adolphe Jean Menjou was an American actor. His career spanned both silent films and talkies, appearing in such films as The Sheik, A Woman of Paris, Morocco, and A Star is Born...
, Rod La Rocque
Rod La Rocque
-Biography:He was born Roderick La Rocque in Chicago, Illinois. He began appearing in stock theater at the age of seven and eventually ended up at the Essanay Studios in Chicago where he found steady work until the studios closed. He then moved to New York City and worked on the stage until he was...
, Vilma Bánky
Vilma Bánky
Vilma Bánky was a Hungarian-born American silent film actress, although the early part of her acting career began in Budapest, spreading to France, Austria, and Germany...
, Mabel Normand
Mabel Normand
Mabel Normand was an American silent film comedienne and actress. She was a popular star of Mack Sennett's Keystone Studios and is noted as one of the film industry's first female screenwriters, producers and directors...
, Bebe Daniels
Bebe Daniels
Bebe Daniels was an American actress, singer, dancer, writer and producer. She began her career in Hollywood during the silent movie era as a child actress, became a star in musicals like 42nd Street, and later gained further fame on radio and television in Britain...
, Marie Prevost
Marie Prevost
Marie Prevost was a Canadian-born actress of the early days of cinema. During her twenty year career, she made 121 silent and talking pictures.-Early life:...
, Betty Hutton
Betty Hutton
Betty Hutton was an American stage, film, and television actress, comedienne and singer.-Early life:Hutton was born Elizabeth June Thornburg, daughter of a railroad foreman, Percy E. Thornburg and his wife, the former Mabel Lum . While she was very young, her father abandoned the family for...
, Pearl White
Pearl White
Pearl Fay White was an American film actress, the so-called "Stunt Queen" of silent films, most notably in The Perils of Pauline.-Early life:...
and Barbara Stanwyck
Barbara Stanwyck
Barbara Stanwyck was an American actress. She was a film and television star, known during her 60-year career as a consummate and versatile professional with a strong screen presence, and a favorite of directors including Cecil B. DeMille, Fritz Lang and Frank Capra...
along with the Black Dahlia
Black Dahlia
"The Black Dahlia" was a nickname given to Elizabeth Short is an American woman and the victim of a gruesome and much-publicized murder. She acquired the moniker posthumously by newspapers in the habit of nicknaming crimes they found particularly colorful...
murder case. Norma Desmond declares admiration for Greta Garbo
Greta Garbo
Greta Garbo , born Greta Lovisa Gustafsson, was a Swedish film actress. Garbo was an international star and icon during Hollywood's silent and classic periods. Many of Garbo's films were sensational hits, and all but three were profitable...
.
Wilder extended his Hollywood references into some of his casting choices. Erich von Stroheim
Erich von Stroheim
Erich von Stroheim was an Austrian-born film star of the silent era, subsequently noted as an auteur for his directorial work.-Background:...
was a leading director of the silent era. In the role of Max, he watches a film with Norma Desmond, and the briefly shown scene is from Queen Kelly
Queen Kelly
Queen Kelly is the title of an American silent film produced in 1928-29 and released in 1929, originally by United Artists. The film was directed by Erich von Stroheim, starred Gloria Swanson in the title role, and also starred Walter Byron and Seena Owen. It was produced by Joseph P...
(1929), which von Stroheim himself directed with Swanson in the title role. Cecil B. De Mille, often credited as the person most responsible for making Swanson a star, plays himself, and was filmed on the set of his current film Samson and Delilah
Samson and Delilah (1949 film)
Samson and Delilah is a 1949 film made by Paramount Pictures , produced and directed by Cecil B. DeMille and starring Victor Mature and Hedy Lamarr as the title characters...
at Paramount Studios. He calls Norma "young fella," as he had called Swanson, a tiny detail of authenticity suggested by De Mille.
Norma's friends who come to play bridge with her, described in the script as "the waxworks", are Swanson's contemporaries Buster Keaton
Buster Keaton
Joseph Frank "Buster" Keaton was an American comic actor, filmmaker, producer and writer. He was best known for his silent films, in which his trademark was physical comedy with a consistently stoic, deadpan expression, earning him the nickname "The Great Stone Face".Keaton was recognized as the...
, Anna Q. Nilsson
Anna Q. Nilsson
Anna Quirentia Nilsson was a Swedish born American actress who achieved success in American silent movies.-Background:...
and H. B. Warner
H. B. Warner
H. B. Warner was a British actor.-Early life:He was born Henry Byron Charles Stewart Warner-Lickford in St John's Wood, London, England in 1875...
, who, like De Mille, play themselves. Hedda Hopper
Hedda Hopper
Hedda Hopper was an American actress and gossip columnist, whose long-running feud with friend turned arch-rival Louella Parsons became at least as notorious as many of Hopper's columns.-Early life:...
also plays herself, reporting on Norma Desmond's downfall in the film's final scenes. (Coincidentally, both Keaton and Hopper would die on February 1, 1966.)
In a comic scene, Norma Desmond performs a pantomime
Pantomime
Pantomime — not to be confused with a mime artist, a theatrical performer of mime—is a musical-comedy theatrical production traditionally found in the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, Jamaica, South Africa, India, Ireland, Gibraltar and Malta, and is mostly performed during the...
for Joe Gillis as a Mack Sennett
Mack Sennett
Mack Sennett was a Canadian-born American director and was known as the innovator of slapstick comedy in film. During his lifetime he was known at times as the "King of Comedy"...
Bathing Beauty, in homage to Swanson's earliest film roles. She also performs a Charlie Chaplin
Charlie Chaplin
Sir Charles Spencer "Charlie" Chaplin, KBE was an English comic actor, film director and composer best known for his work during the silent film era. He became the most famous film star in the world before the end of World War I...
impersonation identical to one she performed in the film Manhandled
Manhandled (1924 film)
Manhandled is a silent drama film directed by Allan Dwan and starring Gloria Swanson. The film was produced by Famous Players-Lasky at their East Coast Astoria Studios facility and distributed by Paramount Pictures...
(1924).
The bed in the shape of a swan that Norma Desmond slept in was actually owned by the dancer Gaby Deslys
Gaby Deslys
Gaby Deslys was a dancer, singer, and actress of the early 20th century from Marseilles, France. She selected her name for her stage career. It is an abbreviation of Gabrielle of the Lillies. During the 1910s she was exceedingly popular worldwide, making $4,000 a week in the United States alone...
, who died in 1920. It had originally been bought by the Universal prop department at auction after Deslys's death. The bed appeared in The Phantom of the Opera
The Phantom of the Opera (1925 film)
The Phantom of the Opera is a 1925 American silent horror film adaptation of the Gaston Leroux novel of the same title directed by Rupert Julian. The film featured Lon Chaney in the title role as the deformed Phantom who haunts the Paris Opera House, causing murder and mayhem in an attempt to force...
(1925) starring Lon Chaney
Lon Chaney, Sr.
Lon Chaney , nicknamed "The Man of a Thousand Faces," was an American actor during the age of silent films. He was one of the most versatile and powerful actors of early cinema...
.
Wilder also made use of authentic locales. Joe Gillis's home in the Alto Nido apartments is a real apartment block in central Hollywood and was often populated by struggling writers. The scenes of Gillis and Betty Schaefer on Paramount's backlot were filmed on the actual backlot, and the interior of Schwab's Drug Store
Schwab's Drug Store
Schwab's Pharmacy was a drug store located at 8024 Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood, California, and was a popular hangout for movie actors and movie industry dealmakers from the 1930s through the 1950s...
was carefully recreated for several scenes. The exterior scenes of the Desmond house were filmed near an old house on Wilshire Blvd.
Wilshire Boulevard
Wilshire Boulevard is one of the principal east-west arterial roads in Los Angeles, California, United States. It was named for Henry Gaylord Wilshire , an Ohio native who made and lost fortunes in real estate, farming, and gold mining. Henry Wilshire initiated what was to become Wilshire...
built during the 1920s, which by 1949 was owned by the former wife of J. Paul Getty
J. Paul Getty
Jean Paul Getty was an American industrialist. He founded the Getty Oil Company, and in 1957 Fortune magazine named him the richest living American, whilst the 1966 Guinness Book of Records named him as the world's richest private citizen, worth an estimated $1,200 million. At his death, he was...
. The house was also featured five years later in Nicholas Ray
Nicholas Ray
Nicholas Ray was an American film director best known for the movie Rebel Without a Cause....
's Rebel Without a Cause
Rebel Without a Cause
Rebel Without a Cause is a 1955 American drama film about emotionally confused suburban, middle-class teenagers. Directed by Nicholas Ray, it offered both social commentary and an alternative to previous films depicting delinquents in urban slum environments...
. It was later demolished, and an office building now stands in its place.
Critical reception
Evanston, Illinois
Evanston is a suburban municipality in Cook County, Illinois 12 miles north of downtown Chicago, bordering Chicago to the south, Skokie to the west, and Wilmette to the north, with an estimated population of 74,360 as of 2003. It is one of the North Shore communities that adjoin Lake Michigan...
. The original edit opened with a scene inside a morgue
Morgue
A morgue or mortuary is used for the storage of human corpses awaiting identification, or removal for autopsy or disposal by burial, cremation or otherwise...
, with the assembled corpses discussing how they came to be there. The story began with the corpse of Joe Gillis recounting his murder to the others. The audience reacted with laughter and seemed unsure whether to view the rest of the film as drama or comedy. After a similar reaction during its second screening, the opening scene was deleted. The new edit was well-received in Poughkeepsie, New York
Poughkeepsie (city), New York
Poughkeepsie is a city in the state of New York, United States, which serves as the county seat of Dutchess County. Poughkeepsie is located in the Hudson River Valley midway between New York City and Albany...
.
In Hollywood, Paramount arranged a private screening for the various studio heads and specially invited guests. After viewing the film, Barbara Stanwyck
Barbara Stanwyck
Barbara Stanwyck was an American actress. She was a film and television star, known during her 60-year career as a consummate and versatile professional with a strong screen presence, and a favorite of directors including Cecil B. DeMille, Fritz Lang and Frank Capra...
bowed to kiss the hem of Gloria Swanson's skirt. Swanson later remembered looking for Mary Pickford
Mary Pickford
Mary Pickford was a Canadian-born motion picture actress, co-founder of the film studio United Artists and one of the original 36 founders of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences...
, only to be told, "She can't show herself, Gloria. She's too overcome. We all are." Louis B. Mayer
Louis B. Mayer
Louis Burt Mayer born Lazar Meir was an American film producer. He is generally cited as the creator of the "star system" within Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in its golden years. Known always as Louis B...
berated Wilder before the crowd of celebrities, saying, "You have disgraced the industry that made and fed you! You should be tarred and feathered and run out of Hollywood!" Actress Mae Murray
Mae Murray
Mae Murray was an American actress, dancer, film producer, and screenwriter. Murray rose to fame during the silent film era and was known as "The Girl with the Bee-Stung Lips" and "The Gardenia of the Screen"....
, a contemporary of Swanson's, was offended by the film and commented, "None of us floozies was that nuts."
Sunset Boulevard attracted a range of positive reviews from critics. Time
Time (magazine)
Time is an American news magazine. A European edition is published from London. Time Europe covers the Middle East, Africa and, since 2003, Latin America. An Asian edition is based in Hong Kong...
described it as a story of "Hollywood at its worst told by Hollywood at its best", while Boxoffice Review wrote "the picture will keep spectators spellbound." James Agee
James Agee
James Rufus Agee was an American author, journalist, poet, screenwriter and film critic. In the 1940s, he was one of the most influential film critics in the U.S...
, writing for Sight and Sound, praised the film and said Wilder and Brackett were "beautifully equipped to do the cold, exact, adroit, sardonic job they have done." Good Housekeeping
Good Housekeeping
Good Housekeeping is a women's magazine owned by the Hearst Corporation, featuring articles about women's interests, product testing by The Good Housekeeping Institute, recipes, diet, health as well as literary articles. It is well known for the "Good Housekeeping Seal," popularly known as the...
described Swanson as a "great lady [who] spans another decade with her magic," while Look
Look (American magazine)
Look was a bi-weekly, general-interest magazine published in Des Moines, Iowa from 1937 to 1971, with more of an emphasis on photographs than articles...
praised her "brilliant and haunting performance."
Some critics accurately foresaw the film's lasting appeal. The Hollywood Reporter
The Hollywood Reporter
Formerly a daily trade magazine, The Hollywood Reporter re-launched in late 2010 as a unique hybrid publication serving the entertainment industry and a consumer audience...
wrote that future generations would "set themselves the task of analyzing the durability and greatness" of the film, while Commonweal
Commonweal
Commonweal is a American journal of opinion edited and managed by lay Catholics. It is headquartered in The Interchurch Center in New York City.-History:...
said that in the future "the Library of Congress will be glad to have in its archives a print of Sunset Boulevard."
The rare negative comments included those from The New Yorker
The New Yorker
The New Yorker is an American magazine of reportage, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons and poetry published by Condé Nast...
, which described the film as "a pretentious slice of Roquefort," containing only "the germ of a good idea." Thomas M. Pryor wrote for the New York Times that the plot device of using the dead Joe Gillis as narrator was "completely unworthy of Brackett and Wilder, but happily it does not interfere with the success of Sunset Boulevard."
After a seven-week run at Radio City Music Hall
Radio City Music Hall
Radio City Music Hall is an entertainment venue located in New York City's Rockefeller Center. Its nickname is the Showplace of the Nation, and it was for a time the leading tourist destination in the city...
, Variety
Variety (magazine)
Variety is an American weekly entertainment-trade magazine founded in New York City, New York, in 1905 by Sime Silverman. With the rise of the importance of the motion-picture industry, Daily Variety, a daily edition based in Los Angeles, California, was founded by Silverman in 1933. In 1998, the...
magazine reported the film had grossed "around $1,020,000", making it one of that cinema's most successful pictures. Variety also noted that, while it was "breaking records in major cities, it is doing below average in ... the sticks." To promote the film, Gloria Swanson traveled by train throughout the United States, visiting 33 cities in a few months. The publicity helped attract people to the cinemas, but in many provincial areas it was considered less than a hit.
23rd Academy Awards (Oscars) – 1950
Sunset Boulevard received 11 Academy Award nominations and won three Academy Awards.| Award | Result | Nominee |
|---|---|---|
| Best Motion Picture Academy Award for Best Picture The Academy Award for Best Picture is one of the Academy Awards of Merit presented annually by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to artists working in the motion picture industry. The Best Picture category is the only category in which every member of the Academy is eligible not only... |
Paramount Paramount Pictures Paramount Pictures Corporation is an American film production and distribution company, located at 5555 Melrose Avenue in Hollywood. Founded in 1912 and currently owned by media conglomerate Viacom, it is America's oldest existing film studio; it is also the last major film studio still... (Charles Brackett Charles Brackett Charles William Brackett was an American novelist, screenwriter, and film producer.-Biography:Born on November 26, 1892 in Saratoga Springs, New York, Charles William Brackett was the son of New York State Senator, lawyer, and banker Edgar Truman Brackett... , Producer) |
|
| Best Director | Billy Wilder Billy Wilder Billy Wilder was an Austro-Hungarian born American filmmaker, screenwriter, producer, artist, and journalist, whose career spanned more than 50 years and 60 films. He is regarded as one of the most brilliant and versatile filmmakers of Hollywood's golden age... |
|
| Best Actor Academy Award for Best Actor Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role is one of the Academy Awards of Merit presented annually by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to recognize an actor who has delivered an outstanding performance while working within the film industry... |
William Holden William Holden William Holden was an American actor. Holden won the Academy Award for Best Actor in 1954 and the Emmy Award for Best Actor in 1974... |
|
| Best Actress Academy Award for Best Actress Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role is one of the Academy Awards of merit presented annually by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to recognize an actress who has delivered an outstanding performance while working within the film industry... |
Gloria Swanson Gloria Swanson Gloria Swanson was an American actress, singer and producer. She was one of the most prominent stars during the silent film era as both an actress and a fashion icon, especially under the direction of Cecil B. DeMille, made dozens of silents and was nominated for the first Academy Award in the... |
|
| Best Writing, Story and Screenplay Academy Award for Best Writing (Original Screenplay) The Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay is the Academy Award for the best script not based upon previously published material. Before 1940, there was an Academy Award for Best Story for writing. For 1940, it and the award in this article were separated into two awards. Beginning with the... |
Charles Brackett Charles Brackett Charles William Brackett was an American novelist, screenwriter, and film producer.-Biography:Born on November 26, 1892 in Saratoga Springs, New York, Charles William Brackett was the son of New York State Senator, lawyer, and banker Edgar Truman Brackett... , D. M. Marshman, Jr. D. M. Marshman, Jr. D.M. Marshman, Jr. born December 21, 1922, is an American screenwriter known mainly for his contribution to the film script for Sunset Boulevard.Marshman was educated at Andover and Yale, receiving his B.A. in 1945... , Billy Wilder Billy Wilder Billy Wilder was an Austro-Hungarian born American filmmaker, screenwriter, producer, artist, and journalist, whose career spanned more than 50 years and 60 films. He is regarded as one of the most brilliant and versatile filmmakers of Hollywood's golden age... |
|
| Best Supporting Actor Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role is one of the Academy Awards of Merit presented annually by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to recognize an actor who has delivered an outstanding performance while working within the film industry. Since its inception, however, the... |
Erich von Stroheim Erich von Stroheim Erich von Stroheim was an Austrian-born film star of the silent era, subsequently noted as an auteur for his directorial work.-Background:... |
|
| Best Supporting Actress Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role is one of the Academy Awards of Merit presented annually by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to recognize an actress who has delivered an outstanding performance while working within the film industry. Since its inception, however, the... |
Nancy Olson Nancy Olson Nancy Ann Olson is an American actress.In Sunset Boulevard she played Betty Schaefer, for which she received an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress... |
|
| Best Art Direction-Set Decoration (Black-and-White) Academy Award for Best Art Direction The Academy Awards are the oldest awards ceremony for achievements in motion pictures. The Academy Award for Best Art Direction recognizes achievement in art direction on a film. The films below are listed with their production year, so the Oscar 2000 for best art direction went to a film from 1999... |
Hans Dreier Hans Dreier Hans Dreier was a film art director.Born in Bremen, Germany, Dreier began his career in German film in 1919 and by the end of the 1920s had relocated to Hollywood.... , John Meehan John Meehan John Meehan was an American art director and production designer.He was born in Tehachapi, California and attended the University of Southern California... , Samuel M. Comer Samuel M. Comer Sam Comer was a set decorator who worked on almost 300 films during a career spanning four decades. He won four Academy Awards and was nominated for another 22 in the category Best Art Direction... , Ray Moyer Ray Moyer Ray Moyer was an American set decorator. He won three Academy Awards and was nominated for nine more in the category Best Art Direction.He was born in Santa Barbara, California and died in Los Angeles, California.... |
|
| Best Cinematography (Black-and-White) Academy Award for Best Cinematography The Academy Award for Best Cinematography is an Academy Award awarded each year to a cinematographer for work in one particular motion picture.-History:... |
John F. Seitz John F. Seitz John Francis Seitz, A.S.C. was an American cinematographer and inventor.He was nominated for seven Academy Awards.-Career:... |
|
| Best Film Editing | Arthur Schmidt, Doane Harrison Doane Harrison Doane Harrison was an American film editor and producer whose career spanned four decades. For nearly twenty years, from 1935-1954, Harrison was a prolific editor of films for Paramount Pictures, including eleven films with director Mitchell Leisen... |
|
| Best Music (Score of a Dramatic or Comedy Picture) Academy Award for Best Original Score The Academy Award for Original Score is presented to the best substantial body of music in the form of dramatic underscoring written specifically for the film by the submitting composer.-Superlatives:... |
Franz Waxman Franz Waxman Franz Waxman was a German-American composer, known for his bravura Carmen Fantasie for violin and orchestra, based on musical themes from the Bizet opera Carmen, and for his musical scores for films.... |
Sunset Boulevards eleven nominations were exceeded only by the fourteen received by All About Eve
All About Eve
All About Eve is a 1950 American drama film written and directed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz, based on the 1946 short story "The Wisdom of Eve", by Mary Orr.The film stars Bette Davis as Margo Channing, a highly regarded but aging Broadway star...
, which won six awards, including Best Picture and Best Director. Many critics predicted that the Best Actress award would be given to Gloria Swanson or Bette Davis
Bette Davis
Ruth Elizabeth "Bette" Davis was an American actress of film, television and theater. Noted for her willingness to play unsympathetic characters, she was highly regarded for her performances in a range of film genres, from contemporary crime melodramas to historical and period films and occasional...
for All About Eve and were surprised that the recipient was newcomer Judy Holliday
Judy Holliday
Judy Holliday was an American actress.Holliday began her career as part of a night-club act, before working in Broadway plays and musicals...
for Born Yesterday
Born Yesterday (1950 film)
Born Yesterday is a 1950 film based on the play of the same name by Garson Kanin and directed by George Cukor. The screenplay was written by Albert Mannheimer with uncredited contributions from Kanin....
. Swanson recalled the press' reaction following Holliday's win: "It slowly dawned on me that they were asking for a larger-than-life scene, or better still, a mad scene. More accurately, they were trying to flush out Norma Desmond."
In an interview years later, Davis bluntly stated that she and Swanson had "cancelled each other out," though in 1982 she told Playboy
Playboy
Playboy is an American men's magazine that features photographs of nude women as well as journalism and fiction. It was founded in Chicago in 1953 by Hugh Hefner and his associates, and funded in part by a $1,000 loan from Hefner's mother. The magazine has grown into Playboy Enterprises, Inc., with...
of her admiration for Swanson's performance, saying, "If she'd won, I'd have shouted hooray. She was sensational, just fantastic."
Sunset Boulevard also received Golden Globe awards for Best Motion Picture – Drama
Golden Globe Award for Best Motion Picture - Drama
This page lists the winners and nominees for the Golden Globe Award for Best Motion Picture – Drama, since its institution in 1951. The organizer, Hollywood Foreign Press Association , is an organization of journalists who cover the United States film industry, but are affiliated with publications...
, Best Motion Picture Actress
Golden Globe Award for Best Actress - Motion Picture Drama
The Golden Globe Award for Best Actress - Motion Picture - Drama was first awarded by the Hollywood Foreign Press Association as a separate category in 1951...
(Swanson), Best Motion Picture Director
Golden Globe Award for Best Director - Motion Picture
This page lists the winners of and nominees for the Golden Globe Award for Best Director. Since its inception in 1943, it has been presented annually by the Hollywood Foreign Press Association, an organization composed of journalists who cover the United States film industry for publications based...
and Best Motion Picture Score. Wilder and Brackett won a Writers Guild of America, East
Writers Guild of America, East
Writers Guild of America, East is a labor union representing writers of television and film and employees of television and radio news. The 2006 membership of the guild was 3,770....
Award for Best Written American Drama, while the Directors Guild of America
Directors Guild of America
Directors Guild of America is an entertainment labor union which represents the interests of film and television directors in the United States motion picture industry...
nominated Wilder for Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Motion Pictures. The National Board of Review
National Board of Review of Motion Pictures
The National Board of Review of Motion Pictures was founded in 1909 in New York City, just 13 years after the birth of cinema, to protest New York City Mayor George B. McClellan, Jr.'s revocation of moving-picture exhibition licenses on Christmas Eve 1908. The mayor believed that the new medium...
voted it Best Picture
National Board of Review Award for Best Film
The National Board of Review Award for Best Film is one of the awards given to either the director or producer of a film by the American National Board of Review.-1930s:-1940s:-1950s:-1960s:-1970s:-1980s:-1990s:-2000s:-2010s:...
, and Swanson received Best Actress.
American Film Institute
American Film Institute
The American Film Institute is an independent non-profit organization created by the National Endowment for the Arts, which was established in 1967 when President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the National Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities Act...
recognition
- 1998 – AFI's 100 Years... 100 MoviesAFI's 100 Years... 100 MoviesThe first of the AFI 100 Years… series of cinematic milestones, AFI's 100 Years…100 Movies is a list of the 100 best American movies, as determined by the American Film Institute from a poll of more than 1,500 artists and leaders in the film industry who chose from a list of 400 nominated movies...
– #12 - 2005 – AFI's 100 Years... 100 Movie QuotesAFI's 100 Years... 100 Movie QuotesPart of the AFI 100 Years... series, AFI's 100 Years... 100 Movie Quotes is a list of the top 100 movie quotations in American cinema. The American Film Institute revealed the list on June 21, 2005, in a three-hour television program on CBS...
:- "All right, Mr. DeMille, I'm ready for my close-up." – #7
- "I am big, it's the pictures that got small!" – #24
- 2005 – AFI's 100 Years of Film ScoresAFI's 100 Years of Film ScoresPart of the AFI 100 Years… series, AFI's 100 Years of Film Scores is a list of the top 25 film scores in American cinema. The list was unveiled by the American Film Institute in 2005.-The List:-External links:**...
– #16 - 2007 – AFI's 100 Years... 100 Movies (10th Anniversary Edition) – #16
Aftermath
Sunset Boulevard was the last collaboration between Wilder and Brackett. They parted amicably and respected their long-term partnership by not airing any grievance publicly. Their mutual respect and courteous integrity remained in force throughout the rest of their lives. In later years, Brackett confided in screenwriter/director Garson KaninGarson Kanin
Garson Kanin was a prolific American writer and director of plays and films.-Film and stage career:...
that he had not anticipated the split, or had ever understood exactly what happened or why. He described it as "an unexpected blow" from which he never recovered fully. When asked to respond to Brackett's comments, Wilder remained silent.
The two men briefly reunited in October 1951 to face charges they had plagiarized
Plagiarism
Plagiarism is defined in dictionaries as the "wrongful appropriation," "close imitation," or "purloining and publication" of another author's "language, thoughts, ideas, or expressions," and the representation of them as one's own original work, but the notion remains problematic with nebulous...
Sunset Boulevard. Former Paramount accountant Stephanie Joan Carlson alleged that in 1947 she had submitted to Wilder and Brackett, at their request, manuscripts of stories, both fictional and based on fact, she had written about studio life. She claimed that one in particular, Past Performance, served as the basis for the Sunset script, and sued the screenwriters and Paramount for $100,000 in general damages
Damages
In law, damages is an award, typically of money, to be paid to a person as compensation for loss or injury; grammatically, it is a singular noun, not plural.- Compensatory damages :...
, $250,000 in punitive damages
Punitive damages
Punitive damages or exemplary damages are damages intended to reform or deter the defendant and others from engaging in conduct similar to that which formed the basis of the lawsuit...
, $700,000 based on the box office returns, and an additional $350,000 for good measure, for a total of $1,400,000. Carlson's suit was dismissed after two and a half years. In 1954, a similar suit was filed by playwright Edra Buckler, who claimed material she had written had been the screenplay's source. Her suit was dismissed the following year.
Brackett's Hollywood career continued after his split with Wilder. He won an Academy Award for his screenplay for Titanic
Titanic (1953 film)
Titanic is a 1953 American drama film directed by Jean Negulesco. Its plot centers on an estranged couple sailing on the maiden voyage of the , which took place in April 1912.-Plot:...
(1953), and wrote Niagara (1953), the breakthrough film for Marilyn Monroe
Marilyn Monroe
Marilyn Monroe was an American actress, singer, model and showgirl who became a major sex symbol, starring in a number of commercially successful motion pictures during the 1950s....
as a dramatic actress. It was Wilder, however, who realized Monroe's comedic abilities in The Seven Year Itch
The Seven Year Itch
The Seven Year Itch is a 1955 American film based on a three-act play with the same name by George Axelrod. The film was co-written and directed by Billy Wilder, and starred Marilyn Monroe and Tom Ewell, reprising his Broadway role...
and Some Like it Hot
Some Like It Hot
Some Like It Hot is an American comedy film, made in 1958 and released in 1959, which was directed by Billy Wilder and starred Marilyn Monroe, Tony Curtis, Jack Lemmon and George Raft. The supporting cast includes Joe E. Brown, Pat O'Brien and Nehemiah Persoff. The film is a remake by Wilder and I....
. Brackett's career waned by the end of the decade.
William Holden began receiving more important parts and his career rose. In 1953, he won the Best Actor Oscar for Stalag 17
Stalag 17
Stalag 17 is a 1953 war film which tells the story of a group of American airmen held in a German World War II prisoner of war camp, who come to suspect that one of their number is a traitor...
, also directed by Wilder, and by 1956 he was the top box-office attraction in the United States.
Nancy Olson's pairing with William Holden was considered a success, and she appeared opposite him in several films during the 1950s, although none of them repeated their earlier success. She went on to star in The Absent-Minded Professor
The Absent-Minded Professor
The Absent-Minded Professor is a 1961 black-and-white Walt Disney Productions film based on the short story A Situation of Gravity, by Samuel W. Taylor....
(1960) and Son of Flubber
Son of Flubber
Son of Flubber is the 1963 black-and-white sequel to the Walt Disney children's movie comedy The Absent-Minded Professor , also starring Fred MacMurray as a scientist who has perfected a high-bouncing substance, Flubber that can levitate an automobile and cause athletes to bounce into the sky...
(1961), in which she was paired with Fred MacMurray
Fred MacMurray
Frederick Martin "Fred" MacMurray was an American actor who appeared in more than 100 movies and a successful television series during a career that spanned nearly a half-century, from 1930 to the 1970s....
, but despite the films' popularity with movie-goers, her career stalled.
Similarly, Gloria Swanson was not able to leverage her own success in Sunset Boulevard. Although offered scripts, she felt that they all were poor imitations of Norma Desmond. Imagining a career that would eventually reduce her to playing "a parody of a parody," she virtually retired from films.
Sunset Boulevard was shown in New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
in 1960, and drew such a positive response that Paramount arranged for a limited rerelease in theaters throughout the United States. It is arguably best known to modern audiences as a result of its television screenings since the 1960s.
Stature
In 1989, the film was among the first group of 25 deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" by the Library of CongressLibrary of Congress
The Library of Congress is the research library of the United States Congress, de facto national library of the United States, and the oldest federal cultural institution in the United States. Located in three buildings in Washington, D.C., it is the largest library in the world by shelf space and...
and selected for preservation in the National Film Registry
National Film Registry
The National Film Registry is the United States National Film Preservation Board's selection of films for preservation in the Library of Congress. The Board, established by the National Film Preservation Act of 1988, was reauthorized by acts of Congress in 1992, 1996, 2005, and again in October 2008...
.
Polls conducted by the American Film Institute
American Film Institute
The American Film Institute is an independent non-profit organization created by the National Endowment for the Arts, which was established in 1967 when President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the National Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities Act...
have demonstrated the lasting appeal of Sunset Boulevard and the esteem in which it is held by the modern filmmakers who respond to these polls. In 1998, it was ranked number twelve on a list of "100 Greatest Films". In 2004, two quotes from Sunset Boulevard were included in their poll of "Greatest Movie Quotes": "All right, Mr. De Mille, I'm ready for my close-up" and "I am big, it's the pictures that got small!" at #7 and #24 respectively. In 2005, Franz Waxman's score was named #16 of the top 25 film scores in the AFI's "100 Years of Film Scores" list.
Roger Ebert
Roger Ebert
Roger Joseph Ebert is an American film critic and screenwriter. He is the first film critic to win a Pulitzer Prize for Criticism.Ebert is known for his film review column and for the television programs Sneak Previews, At the Movies with Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert, and Siskel and Ebert and The...
has praised the acting of Holden and von Stroheim and has described Swanson's as "one of the all time greatest performances." He says Sunset Boulevard "remains the best drama ever made about the movies because it sees through the illusions." Pauline Kael
Pauline Kael
Pauline Kael was an American film critic who wrote for The New Yorker magazine from 1968 to 1991. Earlier in her career, her work appeared in City Lights, McCall's and The New Republic....
described the film as "almost too clever, but at its best in its cleverness," and also wrote that it was common to "hear Billy Wilder called the world's greatest director." When Wilder died, many obituaries
Obituary
An obituary is a news article that reports the recent death of a person, typically along with an account of the person's life and information about the upcoming funeral. In large cities and larger newspapers, obituaries are written only for people considered significant...
singled out Sunset Boulevard for comment, describing it as one of his most significant works along with Double Indemnity (1944) and Some Like it Hot (1959).
By the late 1990s, most Sunset Boulevard prints were in poor condition, and since the film was one of the last to be filmed on cellulose nitrate
Nitrocellulose
Nitrocellulose is a highly flammable compound formed by nitrating cellulose through exposure to nitric acid or another powerful nitrating agent. When used as a propellant or low-order explosive, it is also known as guncotton...
filmstock, much of the original negative had perished. Paramount Studios, believing the film merited the effort of a complete restoration, mounted an expensive project to have it digitally
Digital video
Digital video is a type of digital recording system that works by using a digital rather than an analog video signal.The terms camera, video camera, and camcorder are used interchangeably in this article.- History :...
restored. The restored version was released on DVD
DVD
A DVD is an optical disc storage media format, invented and developed by Philips, Sony, Toshiba, and Panasonic in 1995. DVDs offer higher storage capacity than Compact Discs while having the same dimensions....
in 2002. A 2003 BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
review of the restored film described it as "the finest movie ever made about the narcissistic hellhole that is Hollywood."
Remakes
The film was later remade in Burma, titled A Lin Pyawt Chain (Sunset), starring Mo Mo Myint AungMo Mo Myint Aung
Mo Mo Myint Aung is a five-time Myanmar Academy Award winning Burmese actress, best known for her leading lady roles in several Burmese films from the 1980s to the 2000s.-Early life:...
in Gloria Swanson's role.
Other films about Hollywood
While Hollywood had been making films about itself since the 1920s, many of them, such as It's a Great FeelingIt's a Great Feeling
It's a Great Feeling is a Warner Bros. feature film starring Doris Day, Jack Carson, and Dennis Morgan in a spoof of what goes on behind-the-scenes in Hollywood movie-making. The screenplay by Jack Rose and Melville Shavelson was based upon a story by I.A.L. Diamond. The film was directed by...
(1949), were good-natured and fun. Others, such as What Price Hollywood?
What Price Hollywood?
What Price Hollywood? is a 1932 American drama film directed by George Cukor. The screenplay by Gene Fowler, Rowland Brown, Ben Markson, and Jane Murfin is based on a story by Adela Rogers St. Johns.-Plot:...
(1932) and A Star Is Born
A Star Is Born (1937 film)
A Star Is Born is a 1937 Technicolor romantic drama film produced by David O. Selznick and directed by William A. Wellman, with a script by Wellman, Robert Carson, Dorothy Parker and Alan Campbell. It stars Janet Gaynor as an aspiring Hollywood actress, and Fredric March as an aging movie star who...
(1937), hinted at the darker side of Hollywood without explicitly showing it. Sunset Boulevard is considered to be the first to employ such extreme cynicism. It was soon followed by The Bad and the Beautiful
The Bad and the Beautiful
The Bad and the Beautiful is a 1952 MGM melodramatic film that tells the story of a film producer who alienates all around him. It was directed by Vincente Minelli and stars Lana Turner, Kirk Douglas, Walter Pidgeon, Dick Powell, Barry Sullivan, Gloria Grahame and Gilbert Roland. The film was...
(1952), Singin' in the Rain
Singin' in the Rain
Singin' in the Rain is a 1952 American comedy musical film starring Gene Kelly, Donald O'Connor and Debbie Reynolds and directed by Gene Kelly and Stanley Donen, with Kelly also providing the choreography...
(1952) and the musical remake of A Star Is Born
A Star Is Born (1954 film)
A Star Is Born is a 1954 American musical film directed by George Cukor. The screenplay written by Moss Hart was an adaptation of the original 1937 film, which was based on the original screenplay by Robert Carson, Dorothy Parker, and Alan Campbell...
(1954). Though none was as harshly self-critical, each depicted the ease and cruelty with which Hollywood could discard a movie star past his or her prime.
Sunset Boulevard was followed by other films which varied the story of an older actress desperately clinging to her past glory, such as Bette Davis
Bette Davis
Ruth Elizabeth "Bette" Davis was an American actress of film, television and theater. Noted for her willingness to play unsympathetic characters, she was highly regarded for her performances in a range of film genres, from contemporary crime melodramas to historical and period films and occasional...
in The Star (1952) and What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?
What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (film)
What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? is a 1962 American psychological thriller film produced and directed by Robert Aldrich, starring Bette Davis and Joan Crawford. The screenplay by Lukas Heller is based on the novel of the same name by Henry Farrell...
(1962), Joan Crawford
Joan Crawford
Joan Crawford , born Lucille Fay LeSueur, was an American actress in film, television and theatre....
in Torch Song
Torch Song (film)
Torch Song is a 1953 Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer feature film starring Joan Crawford and Michael Wilding in a story about a Broadway star and her rehearsal pianist. The screenplay by John Michael Hayes and Jan Lustig was based upon the story "Why Should I Cry?" by I.A.R. Wylie...
(1953), Geraldine Page
Geraldine Page
Geraldine Sue Page was an American actress. Although she starred in at least two dozen feature films, she is primarily known for her celebrated work in the American theater...
in Sweet Bird of Youth (1962), Susan Hayward
Susan Hayward
Susan Hayward was an American actress.After working as a fashion model in New York, Hayward travelled to Hollywood in 1937 when open auditions were held for the leading role in Gone with the Wind . Although she was not selected, she secured a film contract, and played several small supporting...
in Valley of the Dolls
Valley of the Dolls (film)
The soundtrack was released in 1967. Dionne Warwick sang the title track; however, her version is not on the soundtrack. Warwick was signed to Scepter Records at the time and could not contractually appear...
(1967) and Faye Dunaway
Faye Dunaway
Faye Dunaway is an American actress.Dunaway won an Academy Award for Best Actress for her performance in Network after receiving previous nominations for the critically acclaimed films Bonnie and Clyde and Chinatown...
in Mommie Dearest
Mommie Dearest (film)
Mommie Dearest is a 1981 American biographical drama film about Joan Crawford, starring Faye Dunaway. The film was directed by Frank Perry. The story was adapted for the screen by Robert Getchell, Tracy Hotchner, Frank Perry, and Frank Yablans, based on the 1978 autobiography of the same name by...
(1981). The scenario of an older woman with a gigolo
Gigolo
Gigolo may refer to:* A male prostitute, escort, or dancer, who offers services to women* Gigolo , a 2006 single by Helena Paparizou* Gigolo , a 2003 single by Nick Cannon...
was also used without the Hollywood setting in such films as Senso
Senso (film)
Senso is a 1954 melodrama film, an adaptation of Camillo Boito's Italian novella Senso by the Italian director Luchino Visconti, with Alida Valli as Livia and Farley Granger as Lieutenant Franz Mahler....
(1954) with Alida Valli
Alida Valli
Alida Valli , sometimes simply credited as Valli, was an Italian actress who appeared in more than 100 films, including Mario Soldati's Piccolo mondo antico, Alfred Hitchcock's The Paradine Case, Carol Reed's The Third Man, Michelangelo Antonioni's Il Grido, Luchino Visconti's Senso, Bernardo...
and Farley Granger
Farley Granger
Farley Earle Granger was an American actor. In a career spanning several decades, he was perhaps best known for his two collaborations with Alfred Hitchcock, Rope in 1948 and Strangers on a Train in 1951.-Early life:...
and The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone
The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone
The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone is a 1961 British film made by Seven Arts-Warner Bros. It was directed by José Quintero and produced by Louis De Rochemont with Lothar Wolff as associate producer. The screenplay was written by Gavin Lambert and Jan Read and based on the novel by Tennessee Williams...
(1961), which starred Vivien Leigh
Vivien Leigh
Vivien Leigh, Lady Olivier was an English actress. She won the Best Actress Academy Award for her portrayal of Blanche DuBois in A Streetcar Named Desire , a role she also played on stage in London's West End, as well as for her portrayal of the southern belle Scarlett O'Hara, alongside Clark...
and Warren Beatty
Warren Beatty
Warren Beatty born March 30, 1937) is an American actor, producer, screenwriter and director. He has received a total of fourteen Academy Award nominations, winning one for Best Director in 1982. He has also won four Golden Globe Awards including the Cecil B. DeMille Award.-Early life and...
, while Katharine Hepburn
Katharine Hepburn
Katharine Houghton Hepburn was an American actress of film, stage, and television. In a career that spanned 62 years as a leading lady, she was best known for playing strong-willed, sophisticated women in both dramas and comedies...
's descent into madness in Suddenly, Last Summer
Suddenly, Last Summer (film)
Suddenly, Last Summer is a 1959 American Southern Gothic mystery film based on the play of the same title by Tennessee Williams. The film was directed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz and produced by Sam Spiegel from a screenplay by Gore Vidal and Williams. The music score was by Buxton Orr using themes by...
(1959) has been compared to Norma Desmond's final scene. The Day of the Locust
The Day of the Locust (film)
The Day of the Locust is a 1975 American drama film directed by John Schlesinger. The screenplay by Waldo Salt is based on the 1939 novel of the same title by Nathanael West...
(1975), The Last Tycoon
The Last Tycoon (film)
The Last Tycoon is a 1976 American dramatic film directed by Elia Kazan and produced by Sam Spiegel, based upon Harold Pinter's screenplay adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Last Tycoon, sometimes known as The Love of the Last Tycoon. It stars Robert De Niro, Tony Curtis, Robert Mitchum, Jack...
(1976), and S.O.B. with Julie Andrews
Julie Andrews
Dame Julia Elizabeth Andrews, DBE is an English film and stage actress, singer, and author. She is the recipient of Golden Globe, Emmy, Grammy, BAFTA, People's Choice Award, Theatre World Award, Screen Actors Guild and Academy Award honors...
(1981) depict Hollywood in bitter terms and, like Sunset Boulevard, make use of real backstage settings. Rainer Fassbinder's 1982 film Die Sehnsucht der Veronika Voss
Die Sehnsucht der Veronika Voss
Veronika Voss is a black and white 1982 film directed by Rainer Werner Fassbinder. Its original German title is Die Sehnsucht der Veronika Voss, which means The Longing of Veronika Voss....
also drew heavily from Sunset Boulevard with its subplot of a tragic faded movie star's love affair with a younger man.
Among the more recent films to discuss Sunset Boulevard in their screenplays or imitate its scenes or dialogue are Soapdish
Soapdish
Soapdish is a 1991 comedy film which tells a backstage story of the cast and crew of a popular fictional television soap opera. It stars Sally Field as an aging soap star, joined by Kevin Kline, Robert Downey, Jr., Elisabeth Shue, Whoopi Goldberg, Teri Hatcher, Cathy Moriarty, Garry Marshall, Kathy...
(1991), The Player
The Player
The Player is a 1992 American satirical film directed by Robert Altman from a screenplay by Michael Tolkin based on his own 1988 novel of the same name....
(1992), Gods and Monsters
Gods and Monsters
Gods and Monsters is a 1998 drama film that recounts the last days of the life of troubled film director James Whale, whose homosexuality is a central theme. It stars Ian McKellen as Whale, along with Brendan Fraser, Lynn Redgrave, Lolita Davidovich, and David Dukes...
(1998), Mulholland Drive
Mulholland Drive (film)
Mulholland Drive is a 2001 American neo-noir psychological thriller written and directed by David Lynch, starring Justin Theroux, Naomi Watts, and Laura Harring. The surrealist film was highly acclaimed by many critics and earned Lynch the Prix de la mise en scène at the 2001 Cannes Film Festival...
(2001), Inland Empire
Inland Empire (film)
Inland Empire, sometimes styled as INLAND EMPIRE, is a 2006 mystery film written and directed by David Lynch. It was his first feature-length film since 2001's Mulholland Drive, and shares many similarities with that film. It premiered in Italy at the Venice Film Festival on September 6, 2006...
(2006) and Be Cool
Be Cool
Be Cool is a 2005 crime-comedy film adapted from Elmore Leonard's 1999 novel of the same name and the sequel to Leonard's 1990 novel Get Shorty about mobster Chili Palmer's entrance into the film industry.The film adaptation of Be Cool began production in 2003. It was directed by F...
(2005). The ending of Cecil B. Demented
Cecil B. Demented
Cecil B. Demented is a 2000 black comedy film written and directed by John Waters. The film stars Melanie Griffith as a snobby A-list Hollywood actress who is kidnapped by a band of terrorist filmmakers who force her to star in their underground film...
(2000) is a parody of Sunset Boulevard's final scene.
Television
- On televisionTelevisionTelevision is a telecommunication medium for transmitting and receiving moving images that can be monochrome or colored, with accompanying sound...
, the film inspired a 1959 episode of The Twilight ZoneThe Twilight Zone (1959 TV series)The Twilight Zone is an American anthology television series created by Rod Serling, which ran for five seasons on CBS from 1959 to 1964. The series consisted of unrelated episodes depicting paranormal, futuristic, dystopian, or simply disturbing events; each show typically featured a surprising...
titled "The Sixteen-Millimeter ShrineThe Sixteen-Millimeter Shrine"The Sixteen-Millimeter Shrine" is an episode of the American television anthology series The Twilight Zone.- Synopsis :Aging film star Barbara Jean Trenton secludes herself in her private screening room, where she reminisces about her past by watching her old films...
", in which an aging movie queen, played by Ida LupinoIda LupinoIda Lupino was an English-born film actress and director, and a pioneer among women filmmakers. In her 48-year career, she appeared in 59 films and directed seven others, mostly in the United States. She appeared in serial television programmes 58 times and directed 50 other episodes...
, relives her past glory through watching her movies and at the same time isolating herself from the real world. - The season five premiere of ColumboColumboColumbo is an American crime fiction television film series, which starred Peter Falk as Lieutenant Columbo, a homicide detective with the Los Angeles Police Department. It was created by William Link and Richard Levinson. The show popularized the inverted detective story format...
, titled "Forgotten Lady", also drew heavily from Sunset Boulevard with its storyline of a former star involved in a murder in the midst of a vain attempt at a comeback which her husband, a physician and the murder victim, would not permit because she had a terminal condition that was destroying her memory and would kill her if she continued her attempt at a comeback. This time, the role of the aging diva was played by Janet LeighJanet LeighJanet Leigh , born Jeanette Helen Morrison, was an American actress. She was the wife of actor Tony Curtis from June 1951 to September 1962 and the mother of Kelly Curtis and Jamie Lee Curtis....
. - On The Carol Burnett ShowThe Carol Burnett ShowThe Carol Burnett Show is a variety / sketch comedy television show starring Carol Burnett, Harvey Korman, Vicki Lawrence, Lyle Waggoner, and Tim Conway. It originally ran on CBS from September 11, 1967, to March 29, 1978, for 278 episodes and originated from CBS Television City's Studio 33...
, Carol BurnettCarol BurnettCarol Creighton Burnett is an American actress, comedian, singer, dancer and writer. Burnett started her career in New York. After becoming a hit on Broadway, she made her television debut...
parodied the Norma Desmond character with a recurring sketch about a deranged movie star named "Nora Desmond" and her faithful butler Max. - On an episode of Tiny Toon AdventuresTiny Toon AdventuresSteven Spielberg Presents Tiny Toon Adventures, usually referred to as Tiny Toon Adventures or simply Tiny Toons, is an American animated television series created by Tom Ruegger and produced by Amblin Entertainment and Warner Bros. Animation. It began production as a result of Warner Bros....
, Sepulveda Boulevard, the characters and story are parodied by some of the Tiny Toon characters.
Musical versions
There have been several attempts to make a musical out of Sunset Boulevard.Stapley and Hughes
From around 1952 to 1956, Gloria Swanson herself worked with actor Richard StapleyRichard Stapley
Richard Stapley, also known by the stage name Richard Wyler, was a British-born American actor and writer.-Early life:...
(aka Richard Wyler) and cabaret singer/pianist Dickson Hughes on an adaptation titled Boulevard! (at first Starring Norma Desmond). Stapley and Hughes first approached Swanson about appearing in a musical revue they had written, About Time (based on Time
Time (magazine)
Time is an American news magazine. A European edition is published from London. Time Europe covers the Middle East, Africa and, since 2003, Latin America. An Asian edition is based in Hong Kong...
). Swanson stated that she would return to the stage only in a musical version of her comeback film. Within a week, Stapley and Dickson had written three songs which Swanson approved.
In this version, the romance between Gillis and Schaefer was allowed to blossom, and rather than shoot Gillis at the end, Norma gave the couple her blessing, sending them on their way to live "happily ever after."
Although Paramount gave verbal permission to proceed with the musical, there was no formal legal option. In the late 1950s, Paramount withdrew its consent, leading to the demise of the project.
In 1994, Dickson Hughes incorporated material from Boulevard! into a musical Swanson on Sunset, based on his and Stapley's experiences in writing Boulevard!.
Other failed attempts
Around 1980, Stephen SondheimStephen Sondheim
Stephen Joshua Sondheim is an American composer and lyricist for stage and film. He is the winner of an Academy Award, multiple Tony Awards including the Special Tony Award for Lifetime Achievement in the Theatre, multiple Grammy Awards, a Pulitzer Prize and the Laurence Olivier Award...
and Hal Prince
Hal Prince
Harold Smith Prince is an American theatrical producer and director associated with many of the best-known Broadway musical productions of the past half-century...
were working on a musical adaptation with Norma to be played by Angela Lansbury
Angela Lansbury
Angela Brigid Lansbury CBE is an English actress and singer in theatre, television and motion pictures, whose career has spanned eight decades and earned her more performance Tony Awards than any other individual , with five wins...
.
Sondheim gave up the venture after meeting Billy Wilder, who proposed he write an opera instead of a musical. John Kander
John Kander
John Harold Kander is the American composer of a number of musicals as part of the songwriting team of Kander and Ebb.-Life and career:Kander was born in Kansas City, Missouri, the son of Bernice and Harold S. Kander...
and Fred Ebb
Fred Ebb
Fred Ebb was an American musical theatre lyricist who had many successful collaborations with composer John Kander. The Kander and Ebb team frequently wrote for such performers as Liza Minnelli and Chita Rivera....
were asked to write it. Finally Andrew Lloyd Webber took the opportunity to create a musical.
Lloyd Webber and Black & Hampton
A musical titled Sunset BoulevardSunset Boulevard (musical)
Sunset Boulevard is a musical with book and lyrics by Don Black and Christopher Hampton and music by Andrew Lloyd Webber. Based on the 1950 film of the same title, the plot revolves around Norma Desmond, a faded star of the silent screen era, living in the past in her decaying mansion on the...
with music by Andrew Lloyd Webber
Andrew Lloyd Webber
Andrew Lloyd Webber, Baron Lloyd-Webber is an English composer of musical theatre.Lloyd Webber has achieved great popular success in musical theatre. Several of his musicals have run for more than a decade both in the West End and on Broadway. He has composed 13 musicals, a song cycle, a set of...
and book and lyrics by Don Black and Christopher Hampton
Christopher Hampton
Christopher James Hampton CBE, FRSL is a British playwright, screen writer and film director. He is best known for his play based on the novel Les Liaisons dangereuses and the film version Dangerous Liaisons and also more recently for writing the nominated screenplay for the film adaptation of...
was performed at the 1992 Sydmonton Festival
Sydmonton Festival
The Sydmonton Festival is a summer arts festival presented in a deconsecrated 16th century chapel on the grounds of Sydmonton Court, Andrew Lloyd Webber's Hampshire estate...
, before opening in London the following year. It closely followed the film story, retained much of the dialogue and attempted to present similar set designs.
Title
The title of the film is commonly spelled Sunset Boulevard, as it was for the film's original theatrical trailer and the National Film RegistryNational Film Registry
The National Film Registry is the United States National Film Preservation Board's selection of films for preservation in the Library of Congress. The Board, established by the National Film Preservation Act of 1988, was reauthorized by acts of Congress in 1992, 1996, 2005, and again in October 2008...
. However, since the film opens with a shot of a street curb which has a stencil of Sunset Blvd in capital letters (instead of a title sequence), the title is sometimes spelled "Sunset Blvd.", for instance by Leonard Maltin
Leonard Maltin
Leonard Maltin is an American film and animated film critic and historian, author of several mainstream books on cinema, focusing on nostalgic, celebratory narratives.-Personal life:...
's Film Guide, the IMDb, and the registration with the Library of Congress
Library of Congress
The Library of Congress is the research library of the United States Congress, de facto national library of the United States, and the oldest federal cultural institution in the United States. Located in three buildings in Washington, D.C., it is the largest library in the world by shelf space and...
.
Adaptations to other media
Sunset Boulevard was dramatized as an hour-long radio play on the September 17, 1951 broadcast of Lux Radio TheaterLux Radio Theater
Lux Radio Theater, a long-run classic radio anthology series, was broadcast on the NBC Blue Network ; CBS and NBC . Initially, the series adapted Broadway plays during its first two seasons before it began adapting films. These hour-long radio programs were performed live before studio audiences...
with Gloria Swanson and William Holden in their original film roles.