Marjorie Morningstar is a 1958 melodrama film based on the 1955 novel of the same name. The film, released by Warner Bros. Pictures and directed by Irving Rapper tells a fictional coming of age story about a young Jewish girl in New York City in the 1950s. The film's trajectory traces Marjorie Morgenstern's attempts to become an artist - exemplified through her relationship with the actor and playwright Noel Airman.

The central conflict in the film revolves around the traditional models of social behavior and religious behavior expected by New York Jewish families in the 1950s, and Marjorie's desire to follow an unconventional path.

The film is notable for its inclusion of Jewish religious scenes - including a Passover meal, a synagogue sequence and Jewish icons in the Morgenstern house. These depictions were one of the first times Jewish religion was portrayed overtly in film since The Jazz Singer in 1927. Marjorie Morningstar is also notable for its role in propagating the stereotype of the Jewish American Princess as well as the Jewish mother stereotype.

Synopsis

Marjorie Morgenstern begins the film as a student at Hunter College and the girlfriend of an eligible young man who attends her family's synagogue. Her parents are happy with her choice of mate, and one evening while they flirt in front of the Morgenstern condominium, her mother Rose Morgenstern (Claire Trevor) tells her father, Arnold (Everett Sloane), that she hopes the two kids marry.

Marjorie breaks up with the boy, though, and that summer attends a summer camp in the Adirondacks as a camp counselor. One night, Marjorie and her friend Marsha Zelenko (Carolyn Jones) sneak across to a Borsht Belt resort for adults called South Wind. There she is caught by resort owner Maxwell Greech (George Tobias) who is going to get her in trouble when the resort social director Noel Airman (Gene Kelly) vouches for her as a guest. She begins to work at the resort and begin a relationship with Airman and a friendship with screenplay writer Wally Wronkin (Martin Milner). The latter wants a relationship with Marjorie, but she's tempted by the tragic Airman, who meets the disapproval of her parents. According to them, as demonstrated in a lunch scene with Airman, he lacks the prospects that a true professional should aspire to. Airman, whose original name was the more Jewish Ehrman, renames Marjorie as well from Morgenstern to Morningstar - thus giving us the name of the film.

When Marjorie's Uncle Sampson (Ed Wynn) dies of a heartattack at the camp, the brief affair is interrupted and Marjorie goes back to the city. There she meets a doctor, who she quickly breaks up with when Airman returns to find her. He declares that his love for her has convinced him to attempt to become respectable. Marjorie tells her mother, and Rose insists that Marjorie bring him to a Passover meal. "Not Passover, mother. He’s not very religious. He doesn’t believe in those things," Marjorie says. Rose answers, "He doesn’t believe in those things... you’re going to get married. How are you going to raise your children?" Airman attends the Passover meal, when a dramatic eruption occurs. In the midst of the meal, he leaves and Marjorie follows him. She is concerned he's bored, and he says, "I wasn’t bored. I was disturbed, deeply. I couldn’t help thinking of all the things I’ve missed in life. Family, your kind of family. Faith, tradition. All the things I’ve been ridiculing all the time. That’s why I couldn’t take it anymore. I love you very much, Marjorie Morgenstern."

Airman gets a job at an advertising firm and seems to be doing well for himself. But one week he disappears, doesn't show up to work, and refuses to take Marjorie's phone calls. She goes to his apartment to check up on him and finds him drunk with a strange women in his apartment. He's decided he can't stand the professional lifestyle and wants to be an artist. The impetus is the success of Wally Wronkin on Broadway - the screenplay writer has launched on a series of hits and Airman is consumed with jealousy. Airman and Marjorie fight, but soon reconcile as Wronkin investors meet with Airman to invest in his play. Despite the investment, Airman's play is panned by critics. "We were crucified," someone explains to Marjorie, and their relationship is unable to survive Airman's incredible failure.

In the final scene, Marjorie is back at South Wind. Greech notes of her that she's done some growing up. In the final shot, we see her board a bus and sit down. It is unclear where she is heading, but when we see her look in the rearview mirror, we see Wronkin in the back of the bus. He smiles. Though the film ends there, the suggestion is that they will embark on the relationship Wronkin had been hoping for from the beginning.

Cast

Natalie Wood who would later go on to her greatest hit, West Side Story, had until Marjorie Morningstar played mostly childish roles, including the role of Judy in Rebel Without a Cause. The NY Times panned her performance, "Natalie Wood, who only yesterday was playing with dolls in films, has blossomed into a vivacious pretty brunette who very likely is as close to a personification of Marjorie as one could wish. But the character is hardly complex, and while Miss Wood is competent in the role, it is rarely a glowing performance."

Gene Kelly was near the end of his career when he appeared in Marjorie Morningstar. He had already appeared in Singin' in the Rain and Brigadoon. Born in 1912, he was 46 when he took the role of Noel Airman. By contrast, his love interest Wood was only 20 years old. The Times said about his appearance that "Although Mr. Kelly appears a mite uncomfortable in his assignment, he plays it with understanding. And, as a professional song-and-dance man, he both hoofs with polish and pleasingly warbles 'A Very Precious Love,' the film's theme number."

Time's critiques of the other performances: "Carolyn Jones, as Miss Wood's best friend, makes it an outspoken performance marked by one truly poignant scene in which she reveals her essential loneliness. Ed Wynn, in the comparatively short role of an impecunious but understanding relative, adds some glint of humor and compassion. Claire Trevor, as Marjorie's over-protective mother and Martin Milner, as the playwright, who is one of Marjorie's retinue of devoted suitors, are well-turned, if not inspired, characterizations."

Remake

In July 2004, a remake of Marjorie Morningstar was announced starring Scarlett Johansson in the part of Marjorie. According to an interview in Moviemaker Magazine, Johansson received the book from her mother. She tells: "I read it and thought, 'Oh my god, this is me,' and I called her and told her 'I'm Marjorie Morningstar,' and she said, 'I know you are.'"

May 11th, 2007, The Forward reported that Johansson had abandoned the film. "It was one of those heartbreak projects that you had to let go," she shared with The Forward. "Sometimes when you have a book like that, there are a lot of rights to it, and everyone’s been involved for such a long time. It was a ‘Too many cooks spoil the broth’ type of thing."

Differences Between the Film and Novel

The most significant difference between the 1955 novel and the 1958 film are the ending. At the end of the novel, the free-spirited Marjorie Morningstar settles down with a man her parents would approve of. In a criticism of Herman Wouk's ending, Alana Newhouse writes in Slate Magazine that "In the final nine pages, the formerly vibrant Marjorie gives up on her career, gets married to a man named Sidney—er, Milton—Schwartz, and moves to Westchester... Most female readers cry when they reach the end of this book, and for good reason. Marjorie Morningstar, as they came to know her, has become another woman entirely: 'You couldn't write a play about her that would run a week, or a novel that would sell a thousand copies. … The only remarkable thing about Mrs. Schwartz is that she ever hoped to be remarkable, that she ever dreamed of being Marjorie Morningstar.'"

In the film, Marjorie seems to go off with Wally Wronkin, the playwright. Though he is successful, unlike Airman, he is far more artistic than the Milton Schwartz Marjorie settles down with at the end of the novel. This ending suggests a different prejudice in the film than Wouk's novel - the lesson is that Marjorie is able to mitigate her desire to break away from tradition, with her parent's wishes. In the novel, the morale seems to be that her only solution is to settle down into the tradition of her parents.

External links

• Marjorie Morningstar at the Internet Movie Database

References

• Popkin, Henry. The Vanishing Jew of Our Popular Culture: The Little Man Is No Longer There.
• Prell, Riv-Ellen. Fighting to Become Americans: Jews, Gender, and the Anxiety of Assimilation. Beacon Press, Boston.
• Dundes, Alex. The J. A. P. and the J. A. M. in American Jokelore. The Journal of American Folklore > Vol. 98, No. 390 (Oct., 1985), pp. 456-475
• Weiler, A.H. Version of Wouk Novel Opens at Music Hall. NY Times, page 32, April 25, 1959.
• Tanabe, Kunio Francis. The Washington Post Book Club - Marjorie Morningstar' by Herman Wouk/ The Washington Post, page BW13, July 4, 2004.
• Newhouse, Alana. Why Do Women Love Marjorie Morningstar? Slate Magazine, Sept. 14, 2005.
• Heifetz, Laurie. Scarlett's Falling Morningstar The Forward, May 11, 2007.

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