TCM Film Fest: Romantic Couples - The Shop Around the Corner, Send Me No Flowers & Lady Sings the Blues

by Christopher James

Billy Dee Williams was present at a screening of Lady Sings the Blues for a Q&A as part of a tribute to him at the TCM Film Festival.It wouldn’t be a trip to the TCM Film Festival if I didn’t catch some of the great romances of yesteryear.

In particular, the enemies to lovers romantic comedy troupe was alive and well. Ernst Lubitsch’s The Shop Around the Corner provides the foundation for this trope. Decades later, Doris Day and Rock Hudson would use this dynamic to great success in many collaborations, including the bonkers comedy Send Me No Flowers. Romance isn’t all fun and games though. The Billie Holliday biopic Lady Sings the Blues borrows less from the biopic genre and focuses more on the troubled relationship between Holliday (Diana Ross) and Louis McKay (Billy Dee Williams, an honoree at this year’s festival).

Did all these pairs sell us on their celluloid love? Find out after the jump...

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Counter-Point: The 50 “Best” Rom-Coms (Pre-’90s)

by Mark Brinkerhoff

That sound you heard this week? It likely was #FilmTwitter collectively reeling from reading The Ringer staff’s list of the 50 “best” romantic comedies of all time. What prompted such a breathless response, however, was that only one of the films on the instantly infamous list pre-dated the 1980s, and it *wasn’t* Annie Hall. No, that Best Picture-winning, genre-redefining classic didn’t make the top *50*, Harold and Maude did. 

Now far be it for me to quibble about anything the late, great Hal Ashby made (namely Harold and Maude) but the otherwise ignorance of literally more than half a century of not only the very best rom-coms, but some of the finest films of all time—period—can’t go unnoticed. So with that, here’s a non-exhaustive, chronological list of the “best” rom-coms from the genre’s Golden Age in the ’30s through its modernization in the ’70s/’80s with links to where you can watch them...

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Doris Day @ 100: 'With Six You Get Eggroll'

Team Experience has been celebrating Doris Day for her Centennial. 

by Nathaniel R

Most careers peter out. Not so with Doris Day's. The most bankable actress of the first half of the 1960s chose to wrap it up at the first real sign that her popularity was waning. Her last top ten of the year hit was the bizarre comedy The Glass Bottom Boat (1966) but her last film, a blended family comedy called With Six You Get Eggroll (1968), was also a hit albeit not as big as her usual successes. The 1960s were tumultuous on all fronts including ideas about sexuality. The media became snide about Day, infamously dubbing her "The World's Oldest Virgin".

In retrospect, with only anecdotal history to go on, it's fascinating that Doris Day was supposedly rejected on these grounds when Julie Andrews, the box office queen of the second half of the 1960s, was not exactly a repudiation of the Day persona; sunny, funny, wholesome, short-haired musical blonde whose chemistry with male co-stars was undeniable but hardly horny...

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Doris Day @ 100: "Pillow Talk"

By Christopher James

Doris Day had the biggest hit of career with "Pillow Talk," which was her first movie with Rock Hudson

Doris Day’s sole Oscar nomination came for Pillow Talk. If this isn’t the best performance of her career, it’s at least the most iconic version of her persona. For those looking to get a sense of her star character, this is the best place to start. Pillow Talk was the highest grossing movie of Day’s career, and the start of her most bankable period. According to the Numbers, Pillow Talk was the fifth highest grossing film of 1959 with $18 million box office (roughly $182 million adjusted for inflation). In addition to acting, Day also sings three songs in the film, most notably the titular song that plays over the delightful opening credits.

It’s impossible to resist the pairing of Rock Hudson and Doris Day in Pillow Talk. While Down with Love most infamously used this film for reference, so many modern romantic comedies and sitcoms mine from Pillow Talk, which effectively wrings laughs from miscommunications, mistaken identities and odd couple dynamics...

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Doris Day @ 100: "The Man Who Knew Too Much"

To celebrate Doris Day's Centennial we're watching a few of the superstar's movies...

by Cláudio Alves

No matter how popular she was in her heyday, it's hard to look at Doris Day's lasting legacy and not think she's a tad underrated. Perhaps not as a comedienne or a songstress, but surely as an actress. Especially as a dramatic actress. While Day consolidated her stardom with many musicals and romantic comedies, her range went beyond such genres. She could as easily make her audience swoon and laugh as she could break their hearts and rile up adrenaline through pure suspense. So as we celebrate the star's centennial, let's appreciate the full breadth of her talents and shine a light on her brief stint as one of Alfred Hitchcock's (not so) icy blondes…

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