Star!

A musical about the life of the stage performer Gertrude Lawrence. It opens with a documentary being shot: Lawrence watches a film about her own life and breaks in to correct it. So the film shows both the life and her objection to the showing of it. The story begins in London. A girl working small stages with her father, then choruses, then revues and finally the West End. Then America, Broadway and large productions. Its second subject is the price of that rise: marriages, a relationship with her daughter that never forms, money she cannot manage and the constant need to work. The songs come from the real repertoire of the period and the numbers were staged as large productions. Julie Andrews plays Lawrence. Taking the part was a deliberate choice; she wanted out of the likeable image of her two previous films. Robert Wise directed; he had worked with Andrews before. The production was a large failure at the box office. The studio cut it and released it again under another title, which also failed. It counts among the films that ended the era of the big-budget musical. An interesting production for anyone who likes classic musicals and stage history. For a viewer wanting something short, it runs close to three hours and the narrative proceeds in sections.