Funny Girl

Normally I do my retrospective of the nominees for the Best Picture Oscar at the end of the year, but rather than cram them all in I'll do one a month or so until the end of the year. I'll start with Funny Girl, a kind of film that isn't made anymore--the big roadshow musical that runs for almost three hours and convinces people it's great even though it isn't.

Funny Girl was directed by William Wyler, who made all kinds of pictures, but it's hard to believe the man who made Mrs. Miniver was still making pictures in 1968. It was based on the Broadway musical of the same name, and starred the same woman who played it on stage: Barbra Streisand.

When viewed as a conduit for the talent of Streisand, Funny Girl is a success, otherwise it's kind of a bore and over-produced. Streisand has been a constant in my life since I can remember (she shares my birthday, though she's 19 years older). But watching this film for the first time I was left breathless with her gifts for both music and comedy. She made some comedies in the '70s but then got more serious and finally stopped making films altogether. It's a shame, because she was funny.

The story is that of Fanny Brice, a performer in Ziegfeld's Follies. It's highly fictionalized, but Brice did grow up on the Lower East Side and did marry a gambler named Nicky Arnstein. Other than that, there's not much accurate. Brice was primarily a comedian, not a classic beauty, which is played up in the film. For much of their courtship, Streisand's Brice can't believe that someone as handsome and suave as Arnstein (Omar Sharif) would be interested in her. It's even implied that she was a virgin until he came along, though she was married in her teens.

Anyway, the spine of the film is that though she isn't beautiful, she is funny, which is kind of like saying a blind date has a nice personality. We see many musical numbers, such as Brice on roller skates when she doesn't know how, and then the scene that earns her raves--coming out in a bridal gown with a pillow stuffed under her dress. Ziegfeld (Walter Pidgeon) almost fires her for it, but can't ignore the audience's laughter. Soon she's a big star.

The second half of the film, after Brice and Arnstein marry, is the Arnstein's financial struggle. He resents Brice bailing him out (she was making a lot of money) and he is determined to be the breadwinner, even going to jail selling phony bonds. In truth, Arnstein leeched off of Brice, but here he is made to seem noble, as he decides to end the marriage rather than tarnish her by his association.

One interesting thing about the film is that is does not make any attempt to de-emphasize Brice's Jewishness. Streisand uses Yiddish inflection in her speech, and of course she has the nose to go along with it. Arnstein was also Jewish, though Sharif was Egyptian born (and his home country didn't like it). Streisand, in her first film, won an Oscar for her performance (she tied with Katharine Hepburn) and has never replicated the star wattage she showed in that film.

While Funny Girl has more misses than hits, Wyler does show off a bit during the number "Don't Rain on My Parade." He has two aerial zoom shots--one starting in a long shot of a train, zooming in on Streisand actually sitting in the train. The logistics of that must have been a nightmare. Then, to end the song, Streisand is a on a tug boat (trying to catch a cruise ship that Sharif is on). The camera again zooms in on her, and then back out, going to black for intermission. Pretty good director, that Wyler.