Rating: NR
Genre:
Comedy
Release Date: 04/22/2003
SubTitles: English/French/Espanol
Dubbed: English
Sound: DD5.1
Run Time: 110 Minutes
Flags: Suitable for Children
Distributor/Studio: Warner Home Video
Cole Porter's
Kiss Me Kate is a
musical within a
musical -- altogether appropriate, since its source material,
Shakespeare's
The Taming of the Shrew, was a play within a play.
Howard Keel and
Kathryn Grayson star as famous Broadway singing team who haven't worked together since their acrimonious divorce.
Keel, collaborating with
Cole Porter (played by
Ron Randell), plans to star in a
musical version of
The Taming of the Shrew titled "Kiss Me Kate." Both he and
Porter agree that only one actress should play the tempestuous
Katherine, and that's
Grayson. But she isn't buying, especially after discovering that
Keel's latest paramour,
Ann Miller, is going to be playing
Bianca. Besides,
Grayson is about to retire from showbiz to marry the "
Ralph Bellamy character," played not by
Bellamy, but by
Willard Parker. A couple of gangsters (
James Whitmore and
Keenan Wynn) arrive on the scene, convinced
Keel is heavily in debt to their boss; actually, a young hoofer in the chorus (
Tommy Rall) owes the money, but signed
Keel's name to an IOU. But since
Grayson is having second thoughts about going on-stage,
Keel plays along with the hoods, who force
Grayson at gunpoint to co-star with her ex-husband so that they'll get paid off. Later the roles are reversed, and the gangsters are themselves finagled into appearing on-stage, Elizabethan costumes and all, though that scene is less of a comic success. This aside,
Kiss Me Kate is a well-appointed (if bowdlerized) film adaptation of the
Porter musical. Virtually all of the play's songs are retained for the screen version, notably
"So in Love," "Wunderbar," "Faithful in My Fashion," "Too Darn Hot," "Why Can't You Behave?," "Brush Up Your Shakespeare" (a delightful duet delivered delightfully by
Keenan Wynn and
James Whitmore), and the title song. Additionally,
Porter lifted a song from another play,
Out of This World, and incorporated it in the movie version of
Kiss Me Kate; as a result,
"From This Moment On" has been included in all subsequent stagings of
Kate. This
MGM musical has the distinction of being filmed in 3-D, which is why
Howard Keel and
Kathryn Grayson throw so many chairs, dishes, and pieces of fruit at the camera in their domestic battle scenes.
~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
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