Royal Wedding
About Royal Wedding
Tom and Ellen Bowen, a brother-and-sister act, take their Broadway show Every Night at Seven to London for the 1947 wedding of Princess Elizabeth and Philip Mountbatten. On the ship Ellen falls for Lord John Brindale. In London Tom falls for dancer Anne Ashmond, finds that the fiancé she thinks is waiting in Chicago is already married, and helps her with her parents. Both couples marry on the wedding day, with agent Edgar Klinger arranging the paperwork.
Cast & crew
More about Royal Wedding
Stanley Donen directed. Burton Lane wrote the music and Alan Jay Lerner the lyrics. Nick Castle choreographed. Robert H. Planck photographed it. Charles Walters was the first director. June Allyson was cast opposite Fred Astaire, became pregnant, and was replaced by Judy Garland, whom MGM then released from her contract on 28 September 1950 after missed days. Jane Powell took the part. Shooting ran from 6 July to 24 August 1950, with retakes in mid-October. In Britain the film was called Wedding Bells.
Themes
Background
The story is set in London in 1947, at the wedding of Princess Elizabeth and Philip Mountbatten.
Making
The ceiling dance for "You're All the World to Me" was shot inside a revolving barrel. John Arnold built a camera mount that could turn 360 degrees along the lens axis. The number later prompted Lionel Richie's song "Dancing on the Ceiling" and a similar video.
Look
Robert H. Planck photographed it. The wall-and-ceiling dance used a set built inside a revolving barrel and a camera mount designed by John Arnold.
Technique
MGM's revolving camera mount let the camera roll a full turn on the lens axis as well as pan and tilt.
Music
Burton Lane wrote the music and Alan Jay Lerner the lyrics, including "Ev'ry Night at Seven," "Sunday Jumps," "Open Your Eyes," and "You're All the World to Me."
Preservation
Entered the public domain in the United States after MGM did not renew the copyright.
Notes
- Fred Astaire plays Tom, Jane Powell Ellen, Peter Lawford Lord Brindale, and Sarah Churchill Anne Ashmond.
- Keenan Wynn plays both Irving Klinger and his London brother Edgar.
- Sunday Jumps" has Astaire dance with a hat rack. In 1997 his widow licensed a digitally altered version to Dirt Devil; his daughter Ava Astaire objected in public.
- The shipboard waltz "Open Your Eyes" turns comic when a storm slides the dancers, based on a crossing Astaire made with his wife in the 1920s.
- MGM failed to renew the copyright, and the film entered the public domain.
Scenes
- Astaire dances up the walls and across the ceiling of his hotel room.
- A storm turns the shipboard waltz into a slide.
- Astaire dances with a hat rack in the gym.
Influenced
- Dancing on the Ceiling (Lionel Richie video)
Also available
- Internet Archive (royal_wedding)
