Copyright 1959 by 20th Century-Fox Film Corp. U.S. release and New York opening (at the Paramount): 17 November 1959. U.K. release: January 1960. Australian release: 18 February 1960. Sydney opening at the Regent. 11,057 feet. 123 minutes.
SYNOPSIS: "A soap opera about a Cinderella from London who came to Hollywood and took care of a noisy drunk." — Gregory Peck.
NOTES: By late 1959 CinemaScope's box-office lure had so dramatically declined that Fox's publicity department offered a choice of advertising blocks — with or without the CinemaScope logo!
COMMENT: Gregory Peck is certainly uncomfortable in the role of F. Scott Fitzgerald and doesn't sink himself into the character at all. It's just Gregory Peck reading lines — and reading them very badly. And Eddie Albert bears as much resemblance to Robert Benchley as I do to W.C. Fields. And there's a distasteful caricature of Alice Faye (played by Karin Booth) which is obviously so untrue (Faye must have been barely half the age at the time), it makes one suspicious of all the rest of the scenes in the film — though certainly the bit about Mankiewicz firing Fitz from "Three Comrades" is true enough, except for the fact that Herbert Rudley doesn't look a bit like Mankiewicz! Half-asleep direction by Henry King doesn't help this movie either!
SYNOPSIS: "A soap opera about a Cinderella from London who came to Hollywood and took care of a noisy drunk." — Gregory Peck.
NOTES: By late 1959 CinemaScope's box-office lure had so dramatically declined that Fox's publicity department offered a choice of advertising blocks — with or without the CinemaScope logo!
COMMENT: Gregory Peck is certainly uncomfortable in the role of F. Scott Fitzgerald and doesn't sink himself into the character at all. It's just Gregory Peck reading lines — and reading them very badly. And Eddie Albert bears as much resemblance to Robert Benchley as I do to W.C. Fields. And there's a distasteful caricature of Alice Faye (played by Karin Booth) which is obviously so untrue (Faye must have been barely half the age at the time), it makes one suspicious of all the rest of the scenes in the film — though certainly the bit about Mankiewicz firing Fitz from "Three Comrades" is true enough, except for the fact that Herbert Rudley doesn't look a bit like Mankiewicz! Half-asleep direction by Henry King doesn't help this movie either!