Jack Lemmon got his first major film role in 1954. This actor, who would go on to be a two-time Academy Award winner, got his start at 28 with Columbia Pictures. His first two films as lead were romantic comedies opposite Judy Holliday. The comedienne was already an established Broadway star and a Best Actress Oscar winner for her role in “Born Yesterday” (1950).
Different Stories
Although these movies star the same lead couple, they have very different relationships in each film. In “It Should Happen to You,” Judy Holliday plays Gladys Glover, a funny young woman, who goes to New York to make a name for herself, and does this by putting her name on billboards. Jack Lemmon plays a documentary-maker named Pete Sheppard who falls in love with Gladys, but is frustrated by her craze for notoriety. In “Phffft!,” they play Robert and Nina Tracy, a successful married couple in New York, who get divorced after eight years of marriage at the beginning of the film. She is a television writer, and he is a lawyer.
Peter Lawford plays the third member of a love triangle in “It Should Happen to You” as Evan Adams III, the playboy heir to a soap manufacturing company, who makes a play for Gladys as his company’s spokeswoman. Brod Clinton (Michael O’Shea) plays a hard-bitten television host who realizes he can make a fortune by cashing in on the “screwball” image of “the girl who believes in signs.”
In “Phffft!,” the divorced couple date others, including his secretary, her television show’s leading man, and a ditzy flirt named Janis (Kim Novak). Jack Carson plays Robert’s best friend Charlie Nelson, a shifty playwright.
A Big Change
A big change for Hollywood came in 1954. I don’t mean the growing popularity of television, the success of foreign and independent films, or the recent breakup of the studios’ theater monopolies. The biggest change was in the content of major studio productions, but it wasn’t big news. It happened quietly behind the scenes, with only a few industry papers giving it coverage.On Oct. 14, 1954, Joseph I. Breen officially retired from his role as president of the Production Code Administration (PCA) and was replaced by his longtime assistant, Geoffrey M. Shurlock. At the time, very few people knew who Breen was, who Shurlock was, or what the PCA was, so seemed of little significance. However, this change in leadership at an obscure Hollywood office played a huge role in the content and quality of entertainment for the nation and the world.
Most people were familiar with another name for the PCA: the Hays Office. Since the 1920s, the Hays Office was shorthand for Hollywood’s in-house content regulation organization, which was officially called the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America (MPPDA) from 1922 to 1945, the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) from 1945 to 2019, and the Motion Picture Association (MPA) since 2019.
Founded in 1922, the MPA is a trade organization which includes the major Hollywood motion picture studios, originally formed as a goodwill agency to improve the film industry’s moral reputation after some bad press.
Across its three names and 102 years of existence, this organization has only done two things which have significantly impacted the moviegoing public: founding the subdivisions of the PCA; and the Classification and Rating Administration, the current rating system, which replaced the PCA in 1968. The dissolution of the PCA after 34 years of existence wasn’t a sudden change; it was the result of what happened in 1954.
Change Starts Small
By today’s standards, both films are wholesome movies. However, “Phffft!” has some surprisingly risqué moments for a movie from the mid-1950s. The taboo term, “sex lives,” is used. There is a lot of suggestive discussion of beds, both before and after the main couple is married. It’s a recurring gag throughout the movie that Robert is always reading a sleazy book, even when still married to Nina, which we hear in his overdubbed voice. Charlie Nelson is an unashamed womanizer who discusses his exploits plainly. Janis is a loose young woman, who dresses suggestively and happily flaunts herself to any man who buys her dinner. Most of these things are between the lines, of course, but it isn’t that subtle.
Of course, “Phffft!” wasn’t rushed into production on Oct. 15, the day after Breen retired. Obviously, it was made while he was still technically in charge. However, he began withdrawing throughout the year, working less and less before his retirement became official. During that time, the standards began loosening in preparation for his departure, since the other members of the PCA didn’t hold films to as high of a standard.
Both these movies are very entertaining to watch. They both are hilarious, romantic, and great examples of their stars’ talent. However, the earlier film is much more meaningful, charming, and touching. It also is deeper, since it has substance instead of the cheap dirty jokes which were Hollywood’s meat and potatoes before and after Breen was in charge. It’s a shame that Lemmon only made one Breen Era-movie, since he was talented enough to be successful without suggestive content.
