Bye Bye Birdie
Directed by George Sidney
Written by Irving Brecher from a book by Michael Stewart
1963/USA
Columbia Pictures Corporation/Kohlmar-Sidney Productions
Repeat viewing/Amazon Instant
[box] Harry McAfee: The next time I have a daughter, I hope it’s a boy![/box]
This blast from the past is enjoyable, if for no other reason, watching Ann-Margret take off!
Albert F Peterson (Dick Van Dyke) is a failing song writer who would really rather be engaging in bio-chemistry experiments. His overbearing mother (Maureen Stapleton) has been standing between him and marriage to the long suffering Rosie (Janet Leigh). Rosie gets a brainstorm. Rock star Conrad Birdie has been drafted. She pitches an idea to have a representative teenager give him a farewell kiss while he is singing a song written by Albert for the occasion on the Ed Sullivan Show. Amazingly Sullivan buys it.
The lucky girl selected is small-town teenager Kim MacAffee (Ann-Margret). The media circus complicates her relationship with new steady Hugo (Bobby Rydell) and with her father (Paul Lynde) and mother.
This is yet another show I was in in my teens. Actually, the stage play is better and less crazy than the movie version. We did not, however, have the incandescent Ann-Margret! Nostalgia made it an enjoyable watch for me.
Bye Bye Birdie was nominated`for Academy Awards in the categories of Best Music, Scoring of Music, Adaptation or Treatment and Best Sound.
Trailer
Love the score. LOVE the bouncy and beautiful Ann-Margret.
Poor Dick Van Dyke who was really the lead was just blown away by the phenomenon that was Ann-Margret.
I love Bye Bye Birdie so much!
What I think is REALLY brilliant is how the Conrad Birdie songs feel so much like real Elvis songs!
Jesse Pearson doesn’t have much to say but he is perfect as a teen idol.
You were in my this show? As a stage production?
Yes, I played Mrs. MacAffee in an amateur teenage production of the stage musical.