Themes: Fathers and Sons, Crumbling Marriages, Haunted By the Past
Main Cast: Paul Newman, Elizabeth Taylor, Burl Ives, Jack Carson, Judith Anderson, Madeleine Sherwood
Release Year: 1958
Country: US
Run Time: 108 minutes
Plot
This dynamic and commanding adaptation of Tennessee Williams' Pulitzer Prize-winning play focuses on a troubled Southern family and the discord over their dying father's millions. Wealthy plantation owner Big Daddy Pollitt (Burl Ives), celebrating his 65th birthday, is visited by his sons, Brick (Paul Newman) and Gooper (Jack Carson). He has cancer, but a doctor has deliberately and falsely declared it in remission. Seemingly perfect son Gooper and his wife, Mae (Madeleine Sherwood), have several children and are anxiously expecting to inherit Daddy's millions. By contrast, Big Daddy's "favorite," Brick, is a has-been football star who's taken to drinking his days away since the suicide of his "best friend" a year earlier. He resents his wife, Maggie (Elizabeth Taylor), because he believes that she had an affair with his deceased friend. As a result, he refuses to sleep with her, although she remains devoted to him. Since Brick and Maggie have failed to produce any grandchildren, Big Daddy is inclined to leave his estate to Gooper, but Maggie attempts to prevent that by telling him that she is pregnant. Big Daddy knows better, yet he recognizes that Maggie loves Brick so much that she would be willing to do anything for him. Although Brick is self-destructive and resentful, unable to come to terms with his losses, it takes Big Daddy's recognition of his own mortality to make Brick change his perspective. Brick's struggle with his sexual identity, and the nature of his relationship with his "friend," had to be toned down for mass consumption, although this intelligently written and acted film covers such topics as infertility, adultery, and alcoholism that were still considered taboo in the 1950s. Newman brings depth and feeling to the role as Brick, while Taylor succeeds brilliantly in portraying Maggie as a passionate and understanding woman despite her own real-life emotional turmoil over the death of her husband at the time, producer Mike Todd. ~ Don Kaye, All Movie Guide
Review
Paul Newman's first big success came in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, the 1958 film adaptation of playwright Tennessee Williams' claustrophobic drama. Newman got his first Oscar nomination, one of seven for the film, for his role as Brick Pollitt, the former football star, and Elizabeth Taylor was at her feline best as his dangerous wife, Maggie. Some of the more controversial elements of Williams' melodrama were downplayed in the film version so as not to ruffle the censors of the era. But it still remains a steamy, haunting piece of filmmaking under the direction of Richard Brooks. Remakes were executed for television in 1976 and 1984, the latter starring Jessica Lange and Tommy Lee Jones. ~ Michael Betzold, All Movie Guide
Larry Gates - Dr.Baugh; Vaughan Taylor - Deacon Davis; Patty Ann Gerrity - Dixie Pollitt; Rusty Stevens - Sonny Pollitt; Hugh Corcoran - Buster Pollitt; Deborah Miller - Trixie Pollitt; Brian Corcoran - Boy Pollitt; Vince Townsend, Jr. - Lacey; Zelda Cleaver - Sookey; Mildred Dunnock; Bobby Johnson - Groom; Tony Merrill - Party Guest; Jeane Wood - Party Guest
Late one night, Brick Pollitt is putting up high hurdles on a track field. He dreams about his time when he was a football player. Although drunk, he attempts to jump the hurdles and falls. He injures his ankle and is later put on crutches. He along with his wife, Maggie "the Cat", are visiting with his family in Mississippi, awaiting to celebrate Big Daddy's 65th birthday. Depressed, Brick decides to spend his days inside drinking while resisting the affections of his wife, who taunts him about the inheritance of Big Daddy's wealth.
Big Daddy, arriving from the hospital, is unaware that he is dying from cancer because his family and doctors refuse to tell either him or Big Mama. Maggie begs Brick to put care into getting his father’s wealth, but Brick stubbornly refuses. When Big Daddy is fed up with his alcoholic son’s behavior, he demands to know why he is so stubborn. Brick angrily refuses to answer.
Big Daddy forces the issue and the revealing moment ensues when Maggie tells what happened the night Brick's friend Skipper committed suicide. In the film, Maggie reveals she was jealous of Skipper because he had more of Brick's time. She claimed she wanted to ruin their relationship "by any means necessary." She intended to seduce Skipper and put the lie to his relationship with her husband. She got scared and ran away without going through with it. Brick blamed Maggie for Skipper's death. Later, when Big Daddy learns that he will die from cancer before his birthday, he along with Brick decides to give his inheritance to Maggie who "has life". Brick, with his troubles behind him, recognizes the affections of Maggie and the film ends, with the couple having a long kiss.
Production began on March 12, 1958, and by March 19, Taylor had contracted a virus which kept her off the shoot. On March 21, she canceled plans to fly with her husband Mike Todd to New York, where he was to be honored the following day by the New York Friars' Club. The plane crashed, and all passengers were killed. Beset with grief, Taylor remained off the film until April 14, 1958, at which time she returned to the set in a much thinner and weaker condition.[2]
Tennessee Williams so disliked the toned-down film adaptation of his play that he told people in the queue, "This movie will set the industry back 50 years. Go home!"
Academy Awards
Although the film did not win any Academy Awards, it received several nominations including Best Picture, Best Actor (Newman), Best Actress (Taylor), and Best Director (Brooks). The film also received nominations for Best Cinematography, Color (William Daniels), and Best Writing, Screenplay Based on Material from Another Medium.
^Parish, James Robert; Mank, Gregory W.; Stanke, Don E. (1978), The Hollywood Beauties, New Rochelle, New York: Arlington House Publishers, p. 326, ISBN 0-87000-412-3
