|
|
| DESK SET (1957) |
A Twentieth Century-Fox Picture
In CinemaScope and Color by De Luxe, 103 minutes
|
|
|
|
CAST
Richard Sumner: Spencer Tracy
Bunny Watson: Katharine Hepburn
Mike Cutler: Gig Young
Peg Costello: Joan Blondell
Sylvia: Dina Merrill
Ruthie: Sue Randall
Miss Warringer: Neva Patterson
Smithers: Harry Ellerbe
Azae: Nicholas Joy
Alice: Diane Jergens
Cathy: Merry Anders
Old Lady: Ida Moore
Receptionist: Rachel Stephens
Kenny: Sammy Ogg
|
 |
CREDITS
Director: Walter Lang
Producer: Henry Ephron
Scenarists: Phoebe Ephron, Henry Ephron
Based on the play by: William Marchant
As Produced on the Stage by Robert Fryer, Lawrence Carr
Photographer: Leon Shamroy
Art Director: Lyle Wheeler
Associate Art Director: Maurice Ransford
Set Decorator: Walter M. Scott
Associate Set Decorator: Paul S. Fox
Editor: Robert Simpson
Sound Recorders: E. Clayton Ward, Harry M. Leonard
Musical Score: Cyril J. Mockridge
Musical Director: Lionel Newman
Orchestrator: Edward B. Powell
Costumer: Charles Le Maire
Makeup Artist: Ben Nye
Special Photographic Effects: Ray Kellogg
Assistant Director: Hal Herman
Color Consultant: Leonard Doss
Hair Stylist: Helen Turpin
Cinemascope Lenses by: Bausch & Lomb
|
|
|
|
|
SYNOPSIS
Bunny Watson, who possesses a formidable brain and memory, is head of a large TV network's reference library. Together with her quite capable staff, she can answer almost any question. Along comes Richard Sumner, a methods engineer, who has invented an electronic brain called Emerac - or "Emmy," for short - that can answer anything. The girls fear that this cold machine will replace them, sooner or later, and rivalries spring up between Bunny and the inventor.
|
|
|
|
|
|
CRITIQUES
"Solely through their (Hepburn and Tracy's) efforts a second-rate movie becomes tolerable and sometimes even amusing. Miss Hepburn is as beguiling as always. She is at her best disarming the engineer with feats of memory and thrusts of wit. She manages to bring some depth to a character that really has none. Tracy accomplishes the same trick, mainly by underplaying his role."
- William K. Zinsser, New York Herald Tribune, 1957
"Best of all, there are Miss Hepburn and Mr. Tracy. They can tote phone books on their heads or balance feathers on their chins and be amusing - which is about the size of what they do here. Under Walter Lang's relaxed direction, they lope through this trifling charade like a couple of oldtimers who enjoy reminiscing with simple routines. Mr. Tracy is masculine and stubborn, Miss Hepburn is feminine and glib. The play is inconsequential. The sets and color are good."
- Bosley Crowther, The New York Times, 1957
"The eighth of the films that co-starred Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn; it was one of their bummers. He's a wizard engineer. She's in charge of a TV-network research department, and, misunderstanding his intentions, she thinks he means to put her group out of work by installing an electronic brain called Emmy. Gig Young and Joan Blondell help out, but it's a dispirited, straining-for-laughs sit-com. Tracy looks bulky, and Hepburn looks scraggy and cheerless; both seem overage for their roles."
- Pauline Kael, The New Yorker
"Most reviewers agreed at the time that Hepburn got far more out of this mere bauble of a sex comedy than the 1955 Broadway play by William Marchant deserved. In it she plays the leader of an all-female TV network research team fearful of being rendered redundant by the arrival of an electronics expert's computer, with Tracy wooing her into acceptance. If Tracy was never quite as interesting as Hepburn's best comic foil, Cary Grant, he always allowed his offscreen lover ample scope. The results are some splendidly crisp exchanges between the pair, and the inevitable scene of embarrassment where he is literally 'caught with his pants down'."
- Rod McShane, Time Out
|
|
|
|
|
|
COMMENTARY TRACK
"Katie was a wonderful gal. She's a strange person but I've always admired her greatly...She was the kind who would come in and look at sets and say, 'I've got just the thing at home for this,' and bring it in the next day...So she was in on everything and Spence would kid the life out of her saying 'Shut your mouth - go back where you belong in vaudeville.'"
- Walter Lang
"She and Tracy had obviously done the day's work that was coming up, and staged it in their own place where they lived. The director [Walter Lang] had hardly anything to do. She would say, 'Spence and I talked this over. We thought that this might be good for the scene.' And they did the whole thing. And he'd say, 'Well, looks good to me.'"
- Dina Merrill
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
HOME VIDEO AVAILABILITY
Links are provided for information only, and are not endorsements. Please ensure that your player is compatible with the region or standard before purchase.
Region 1:
NTSC Standard:
|
|
|
|
|
|
Spencer Tracy, Katharine Hepburn
|
Spencer Tracy, Katharine Hepburn
|
Spencer Tracy, Katharine Hepburn
|
Katharine Hepburn
|
Sue Randall, Katharine Hepburn, Joan Blondell, Dina Merrill
|
Gig Young, Katharine Hepburn, Spencer Tracy
|
On the set: Katharine Hepburn
|
|
|
