Victor Victoria

I first saw Blake Edwards' Victor Victoria on Turner Classic Movies maybe five or six years ago. I had wanted to see if for quite some time but didn't get around to it until then. I knew the basic premise of the film and that was about it. Imagine my surprise when I found out that not only was this a delightfully funny film, but also a wonderfully gay positive film as well, especially for a film coming out in 1982. 

Victoria Grant (played by Julie Andrews) is a very down on her luck singer trying to catch a break in 1934 Paris. At the end of her rope and having lost another audition, she decides to get a meal at a local restaurant, intending to scam a free meal by planting a cockroach in her food. While there, she encounters the equally hard up Carole "Toddy" Todd (played by Robert Preston), who recognizes her from the audition and the two share a meal together. Victoria's plan winds up working, but not quite how she anticipated as the bug is discovered and the restaurant erupts into chaos, which allows Victoria and Toddy to escape into the pouring rain of the Paris night. They regroup and get warm at Toddy's apartment. When Victoria goes to gather her now dry clothes and return home, she discovers the cheap garments have dramatically shrunk and are no longer wearable. Toddy offers her a place to stay for the night and says she can wear a suit his ex-boyfriend Richard (played by Malcolm Jamieson) left behind home the next day. However, when he sees Victoria decked out in Richard's clothes a daring scheme occurs to him. He wants to pass Victoria off as a gay female impersonator named Victor and since she's really a woman, her impersonations would be flawless. He takes her to the top talent agent in Paris, Andre Cassell (played by John Rhys-Davies), who books Victor at one of the biggest nightclubs in Paris.   

After six weeks of rehearsal, Victoria makes her big debut and is an instant hit with the audience, especially American nightclub owner King Marchand (played by James Garner), who is in attendance with his brassy dame of a girlfriend Norma (played by Lesley Ann Warren) and loyal bodyguard 'Squash' Bernstein (played by Alex Karras). King is quite taken with Victoria but is shocked when she "reveals" herself to be a man to the audience by removing her wig. He finds himself having trouble reconciling his feelings of attraction to someone he believes to be a man, even though he isn't a 100% convinced. As King's feelings for Victor seem to grow, a jealous Norma returns to Chicago to announce to King's gangster associates of what is going on, leading to all sorts of chaos for King and Victoria as the Mob doesn't take too well to gay people ("Kill him but mustn't kiss him," quips Toddy at one point).

There is so much to like about this film. The script and direction from Blake Edwards is sublime. There are several fantastic and classic moments of physical comedy, from an entire restaurant erupting into chaos (seen in a shot from outside the restaurant no less) to an extended comic sequence that has both King and Squash sneaking around Victoria and Toddy's new Hotel room trying to find out the truth about Victor while trying to avoid detection by either Victoria or Toddy. The performances are all great with Julie Andrews, Robert Preston and Lesley Ann Warren all getting nominations for their performances. James Garner is likewise great with some fantastic chemistry with Julie Andrews. Meanwhile, Alex Karras damn near steals the show as Squash, King's teddy bear of a bodyguard. 

The music in the film is dynamite with both score and songs written by Henry Mancini. The film was created specifically to star Blake Edwards' wife Julie Andrews and he created a wonderful showcase for her with a several fantastic musical numbers, especially "Le Jazz Hot" and "The Shady Dame from Seville". 

Since I'm doing this review for Pride month, I should probably touch on the gay themes that run throughout the piece. Now, there will be some spoilers in this section, so if you want to see the film and not be spoiled you should stop here and come back after viewing the film. Okay, first thing I have to say is how I loved that the film went to great pains to present its gay characters as fully developed characters that are never the butt of the joke. Even the minor gay characters, the chorus dancers we see admiring Victor in rehearsal, are treated decently by the script. For me that seems amazing for a PG rated movie released in 1982. On top of that, the movie presents us with different types of gay men, from the more flamboyant Toddy and the chorus dancers but we also have the more rough and tumble type in what is revealed as a delightful plot twist. Squash returns to his and King's hotel suite to find King in bed with Victoria. Completely misreading the situation, Squash proceeds to come out to King in a sweetly endearing scene. Again, while the scene is humorous the film is never making fun of Squash. The fact that Squash winds up in bed with Toddy later in the film is just icing on the cake. 

My one nitpick with the film, and this is one that even Blake Edwards copped to, is that King doesn't profess his love to Victoria until he's found out for sure she's a woman. Originally, he wasn't supposed to find out until after he's told "Victor" that he loves him and "doesn't care if he's a man" but Blake admitted he chickened out and added the scene of King sneaking around Victoria and Toddy's hotel room. It would have worked better as originally planned though, especially as 'Victor' challenges King's ideas of what makes a real man throughout their courtship. But, I'm willing to give him a pass on this because one, the added sequence was quite funny in the classic Blake Edwards fashion and two he realized his mistake and fixed it for the stage show.   

That's a small nitpick though in a highly entertaining farcical comedy filled with memorable comic bits and witty zingers galore, most courtesy of the delightfully bitchy Robert Preston. It is a very funny comedy that I have watched many time since and has quickly become one of my absolute favorites.