How many women star in their firstmovie at age fifty-four – and win anOscar for doing so? Well, that’s what

happened to Shirley Booth when she madeher film debut for Paramount, reprising herTony Award-winning role in William Inge’sCome Back, Little Sheba. Booth had al-ready had a hugely successful theatre ca-reer and stage work is what she preferred,making only a total of five films before goingon to become a TV star in the hit seriesHazel. She made her final two films in 1958and both of them are represented on thisworld premiere CD release.

Hot Spell, based on a novel by Lonnie Cole-man, had a powerhouse cast; in addition toBooth, the film starred Anthony Quinn,Shirley MacLaine, Earl Holliman and EileenHeckart. The story concerns a loving anddevoted housewife, Alma Duval (Booth),who clings to the past when things weresimpler and better and who tries to cling toher philandering husband (Quinn). She alsotries to cling to her three grown, not-so-lov-ing children (MacLaine, Holliman, and ClintKimbrough), but it’s all a fantasy. Almawould like nothing more than to escape intothe past, to get out of the city and its swel-tering heat and back to her happier times,20 years ago. Her husband eventually takesa powder with another woman and it endstragically. But Alma learns that you can’t gohome again and finally accepts that lifemust go on.

The film’s screenplay by James Poe isclearly in Tennessee Williams and WilliamInge territory. Booth has a field day with herrole – delusional, flighty, and eternally opti-mistic in the face of the drama around her.She’d already made two films with HotSpell’s director, Daniel Mann – Come Back,Little Sheba and About Miss Leslie. Quinnis powerful in his role as someone whodoesn’t want to be clung to and whose mid-life crisis results in tragedy for everyone.MacLaine was wonderfully fresh and uniqueat this point in her career – there wasn’tanyone else quite like her working in movies– and Holliman and Heckart both shine.

The score for Hot Spell was by the brilliantAlex North. By that point in his career, Northhad been composing for Hollywood filmssince 1951, when he came out swingingwith three incredible scores – The 13th Let-ter, A Streetcar Named Desire and Death ofa Salesman (he received Oscar nomina-tions for both Streetcar and Salesman). He

went on to do amazing scores for films likeViva Zapata!, The Rose Tattoo, I’ll Cry To-morrow, The Bad Seed, The Rainmaker andThe Long, Hot Summer. Subsequent to HotSpell, he continued to write unique and bril-liant scores for films like The WonderfulCountry, Spartacus (his magnum opus),The Misfits, Cleopatra, The Children’s Hour,All Fall Down, Cheyenne Autumn, TheAgony and the Ecstasy, Who’s Afraid of Vir-ginia Woolf, The Shoes of the Fisherman,the TV miniseries Rich Man, Poor Man –right into the 1980s with Carny, Prizzi’sHonor and The Dead. And he’s one of thefew film composers who have had the goodfortune to write a huge pop hit – “UnchainedMelody” – one of the most enduring popclassics ever written. Nominated for fifteenAcademy Awards, North never won, but wasgiven an honorary Oscar in 1986.

North’s Hot Spell score is all yearning, delu-sion and heartbreak. His music is truly thespine of the film and illuminates the dramaand the characters – their hopes, theirdreams, their heartaches. Thanks to Northand the actors (as well as the excellent writ-ing and directing), what could have easilydevolved into a melodramatic potboiler be-comes a compelling character-drivendrama.

Shirley Booth’s other star turn that year wasthe polar opposite of Hot Spell: the delightfulfilm adaptation of Thornton Wilder’s popularstage success, The Matchmaker. TheMatchmaker has a rather unusual and col-orful lineage. It began life as a one-act playwritten in 1835 by John Oxenford, entitledA Day Well Spent. In 1842, the one-act wasturned into a full-length play called EinenJux will er sich machen by Austrian play-wright Johann Nestroy. Flash forward to1938 – when playwright Thornton Wilderadapted the Austrian play into The Mer-chant of Yonkers, which was a 39-perfor-mance dud on Broadway. In 1954, directorTyrone Guthrie became interested in doingthe play, and Wilder rewrote it extensively,retitling it The Matchmaker.The most signif-icant change he made was taking a second-ary character named Dolly Gallagher Leviand making her the lead. That versionopened on Broadway in 1955 and ran for486 performances.

Three years later, Paramount brought it tothe screen, starring Booth as Dolly Gal-lagher Levi, Paul Ford as Horace Van-dergelder, Anthony Perkins as Cornelius,

Shirley MacLaine as Irene, and RobertMorse reprising his stage role as Barnaby.The screenplay was by the great JohnMichael Hayes (Rear Window, The ManWho Knew Too Much) and the film was di-rected by Joseph Anthony, who, the yearbefore, had brought the play The Rainmakerto the screen for Paramount. Of course, itwould be just a few years later when TheMatchmaker would undergo yet anothertransformation, this time being turned intoa big, splashy hit Broadway musical, Hello,Dolly!

The film of The Matchmaker is a wonderful,charming comedy, with expert perform-ances by the entire cast. Helping the fun im-measurably is the score by Adolph Deutsch,which captures the homespun Americanabeautifully. His music includes quotes fromtraditional music of the era (“Buffalo Gals”),but is also filled with his own wonderful,melodic themes. Deutsch wittily under-scores the monologues of various charac-ters delivered straight to the camera, orbudding love, and Dolly’s machinations tobring everyone together in blissful happi-ness – including her own.

Deutsch was a really unsung film composer,especially considering the large number ofhuge hit films he worked on. Although hisname is not that well known today, he wrotesome absolutely stellar scores during hislong career, including the music for such all-time classics as They Drive by Night, HighSierra, The Maltese Falcon, The Mask ofDimitrios, Father of the Bride, Tea and Sym-pathy, Some Like it Hot and The Apartment.He also worked on quite a few classic mu-sicals, including Seven Brides for SevenBrothers, Annie Get Your Gun, The BandWagon, Show Boat, Oklahoma! and FunnyFace. During his long career, he took homethree Academy Awards (Annie Get YourGun, Seven Brides for Seven Brothers andOklahoma!). Deutsch retired from film in1961 and passed away in 1980 at the ripeold age of 83.

So, two great Golden Age scores – onesteamy and tragic, one charming and de-lightful – by two great composers: AlexNorth and Adolph Deutsch.

— Bruce Kimmel

Hot Spell/The Matchmaker