Les Girls *** (1957, Gene Kelly, Mitzi Gaynor, Kay Kendall, Taina Elg, Jacques Bergerac, Leslie Phillips, Henry Daniell, Patrick Macnee) – Classic Movie Review 9021

Director George Cukor’s 1957 musical Les Girls is an end-of-an-era event. It stars Gene Kelly, who rounded off his MGM contract with this feisty, slickly mounted Cole Porter musical about the adventures of a continental dancing troupe called Barry Nichols and Les Girls (Kelly and Kay Kendall, Mitzi Gaynor, Taina Elg).

The brightest performance comes from the deliciously madcap Kendall, in an infectiously vivacious performance her US debut, but Gaynor and Elg also greatly please.

Les Girls is the kind of show where you applaud the costumes – they are designed by Orry-Kelly – and the sets – they are designed by Gene Allen and William A Horning. The Cole Porter music is very acceptable, in his final film score. Though it is a cinema original, based on a story by Vera Caspary, it plays like a filmed stage show.

Also in the cast are Jacques Bergerac, Leslie Phillips, Henry Daniell, Patrick Macnee, Stephen Vercoe, Philip Tonge, Richard Alexander, Barrie Chase, Nestor Paiva, Maurice Marsac, Gilchrist Stuart, Adrienne D’Ambricourt, George Davis, Owen McGiveney, Francis Ravel and Maya Van Horn.

Kay Kendall made only two more movies, The Reluctant Debutante and Once More, with Feeling!. She died of myeloid leukemia on 6 September 1959, aged only 33.

Les Girls is directed by George Cukor, runs 114 minutes, is made by Sol C Siegel Productions and Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, is released by MGM, is written by John Patrick, based on a story by Vera Caspary, is shot in Metrocolor by Robert Surtees, is produced by Sol C Siegel and Saul Chaplin, and is scored by Adolph Deutsch, with music and lyrics by Cole Porter, and set designs by Gene Allen and William A Hornung.

Mitzi Gaynor (born Francesca Marlene de Czanyi von Gerber).

Mitzi Gaynor (born Francesca Marlene de Czanyi von Gerber) celebrated her 90th birthday on 4 September 2021. Her notable films include There’s No Business Like Show Business (1954), The Birds and the Bees (1956), The Joker Is Wild (1957) and especially South Pacific (1958).

© Derek Winnert 2019 Classic Movie Review 9021

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