The Glass Slipper *** (1955, Leslie Caron, Michael Wilding, Keenan Wynn, Estelle Winwood, Elsa Lanchester) – Classic Movie Review 11,389

Leslie Caron acts beautifully and dances wonderfully as Ella in The Glass Slipper (1955).

Director Charles Walters’s 1954 Eastmancolor film The Glass Slipper stars Leslie Caron, Michael Wilding, Elsa Lanchester, Barry Jones, Estelle Winwood, Amanda Blake and Keenan Wynn.

MGM’s glossy musical version of the Cinderella story is entertaining but misses the mark as a classic show. A stiff and stolid Wilding fails to charm as the Prince, but the young tomboy-ish Caron, fresh from her success in the 1953 Lili, acts beautifully and dances wonderfully with Roland Petit’s Ballet de Paris, whose three dance routines are the film’s highlights.

Among the delightful character actor veterans, Lanchester amuses as the widow Sonder and Winwood is a delightful Fairy Godmother.

Also in the cast are Lisa Daniels, Lurene Tuttle, and Liliane Montevecchi, with Walter Pidgeon as Narrator.

Libretto and screenplay are by Helen Deutsch, who wrote Lili and the lyrics for its hit song ‘Hi Lili Hi Lo’. Deutsch recalled: ‘MGM gave me one word, Cinderella. That’s how it started. My Cinderella of the 18th century is not based on anyone’s ideas but my own. Waifs were popular characters in the early movies – the Gish era – then gave way to more worldly females. I first revived the waif successfully in Lili.

The Glass Slipper is produced by Edwin H Knopf, scored by Bronislau Kaper (score conducted by Miklós Rózsa), shot by Arthur E Arling, and designed by Daniel B Cathcart and Cedric Gibbons, with costumes by Walter Plunkett and Helen Rose.

It was a surprise flop for MGM, resulting in a loss of $387,000.

Leslie Caron celebrated her 90th birthday on 1 July 2021. She made her film debut in An American in Paris (1951), followed by The Man with a Cloak (1951), Glory Alley (1952), The Story of Three Loves (1953), Lili (1953) and The Glass Slipper (1955).

© Derek Winnert 2021 Classic Movie Review 11,389

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