Some Like It Hot (1959)

OVERVIEW:

Hailed by the American Film Institute as the funniest American movie of all time...

When two Chicago musicians (Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon) accidentally witness the St. Valentine's Day Massacre, they trade in their union suits for flapper frocks and hightail it down to Florida as the newest members of an all-girl jazz band. Things get complicated when they meet sexy band-mate Sugar Kane Kowalczyk (Marilyn Monroe) and eccentric millionaire 'playboy' Osgood Fielding III. Mayhem ensues as they try to keep their true identities hidden from Sugar, Osgood -- and the mobsters who are after them!

Directed by Billy Wilder, Some Like It Hot would mark the first collaboration with his new writing partner, I.A.L. Diamond, as well as Academy-Award winning actor Jack Lemmon, who would go on to star in six of his final ten films.

THE FEMININE TOUCH:

Although director Billy Wilder intended the film to be shot in color, he changed his mind when test footage revealed the greenish tint of Curtis and Lemmon's make-up. To help coach them in the finer points of female impersonation, the film-makers hired Vander Clyde, a legendary drag artist known throughout Europe as Barbette. And as Curtis couldn't maintain a high-pitched voice for an entire take, Paul Frees, who also appears as the "funeral director" of Spats' speakeasy, was engaged to dub the voice of Josephine.

FINAL WORDS:

To close the film, Wilder and Diamond came up with one of the most memorable tag lines in motion picture history: "Nobody's perfect." Interestingly enough, it was not meant to stay in the film. "We wrote it the night before we had to shoot it, and I mentioned a line I'd considered using at some earlier point," recalled Diamond. "Billy said, 'Do you think it's strong enough for the tag of the picture?' and I said 'I don't know.' But it was getting to be 11:00 at night, so we wrote it that way, and he said, 'Well, maybe we'll think of something better on the set.' Fortunately, we didn't think of anything better on the set."