I Love Melvin

I Love Melvin
Theatrical release poster
Directed byDon Weis
Screenplay by
Story byLaszlo Vadnay
Produced byGeorge Wells
Starring
CinematographyHarold Rosson
Edited byAdrienne Fazan
Music byGeorgie Stoll
Production
company
Distributed byLoew's, Inc.
Release date
  • March 20, 1953 (1953-03-20)
Running time
77 minutes
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish
Budget$1.3 million[1]
Box office$1.9 million[1][2]

I Love Melvin is a 1953 American Technicolor musical romantic comedy film directed by Don Weis, starring Donald O'Connor and Debbie Reynolds.[3]

The film's most famous scene depicts Reynolds playing a human American football in a dance sequence. The film reunited O'Connor and Reynolds after 1952's Singin' in the Rain. According to MGM records, the film earned $1,316,000 in the United States and Canada and $654,000 overseas, resulting in a loss of $290,000.[1]

Plot

Judy LeRoy, a chorus girl with dreams of Hollywood stardom, is promoted out of the chorus to play a human football in the Broadway musical Quarterback Kelly. On her way to a dance rehearsal, Judy accidentally bumps into Melvin Hoover, the bumbling assistant to Look magazine photographer Mergo, in Central Park, and after a brief argument, they go their separate ways. That night, after seeing Judy's picture on a poster for Quarterback Kelly, Melvin uses his press credentials and watches her football number from backstage. After the show, as Judy is leaving with her suitor Harry Flack, the heir to a paper box company, Melvin offers to do a photo spread of her for Look, and she accepts.

Melvin visits Judy at her home to take pictures of her, and as they continue spending time together to do photo shoots, they develop feelings for one another. However, Judy's father Frank complains that she has been neglecting Harry. One night, after they go to the movies, Judy reveals to Melvin that her family is pressuring her to marry the well-to-do Harry, and asks him to put her on the cover of Look, hoping her family will leave her alone. Desperate to win Judy's affections, Melvin promises he will try. The next day, he plasters the Look offices with photographs of Judy, but the editors choose to feature a race horse on the cover.

After learning that Quarterback Kelly will close in three weeks, Judy worries that she has no other job prospects. She tells Melvin that Harry proposed to her the previous night, though she has not yet given an answer, and that he is coming to dinner to talk to her father. Melvin enlists Mergo to create a fake issue of Look with Judy's photograph on the cover. As Harry prepares to ask Frank for Judy's hand, Melvin arrives and shows her the fake issue. Before Melvin can explain the truth, Judy excitedly shows it to her family and announces she cannot marry Harry.

When the next issue of Look comes out, Judy and her family are devastated that she is not featured on the cover. Melvin, too nervous to confess the truth, claims that Judy's picture will be on the cover of the next issue. After several issues without Judy on the cover, Frank angrily asks the Look editor, Mr. Henneman, when Judy's cover will come out. As Judy rushes to the Look offices with her mother, Henneman informs them that the cover they saw was a fake, and Judy concludes that Melvin created the fake cover to prevent her from marrying Harry. Mergo reveals that Melvin has disappeared after he quit three weeks earlier. Judy tearfully declares her love for Melvin, and the police begin searching for him.

While hiding in Central Park, Melvin sees a man reading a copy of Look with Judy's picture on the cover. Assuming it is a fake, Melvin grabs the magazine and is chased through the park by the police. Judy and her family arrive and, after learning that Melvin is in the park, start chasing him as well until Judy and Melvin eventually bump into each other on the same spot where they first met. She shows him the magazine, which contains a full-page ad reporting Melvin's disappearance, and the two kiss.

Cast

Music

Lyrics by Mack Gordon, and music by Josef Myrow

  1. "Lady Loves" (Debbie Reynolds)
  2. "We Have Never Met as Yet" (Debbie Reynolds and Donald O'Connor)
  3. "Saturday Afternoon Before the Game" (Chorus)
  4. "Where Did You Learn to Dance" (Debbie Reynolds and Donald O'Connor)
  5. "I Wanna Wander" (Donald O'Connor)
  6. "Life Has Its Funny Ups and Downs" (Noreen Corcoran)

Comic book adaptation

Notes

  1. ^ Additional dialogue

References

  1. ^ a b c The Eddie Mannix Ledger, Los Angeles: Margaret Herrick Library, Center for Motion Picture Study
  2. ^ "Top Grossers of 1953". Variety. Vol. 193, no. 6. January 13, 1954. p. 11. ISSN 0042-2738.
  3. ^ Crowther, Bosley (2008). "New York Times: I Love Melvin". Movies & TV Dept. The New York Times. Archived from the original on May 20, 2008. Retrieved August 4, 2008.
  4. ^ "Movie Love #20". Grand Comics Database.
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