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IMDb > Sex and the Single Girl (1964)

Sex and the Single Girl (1964) More at IMDbPro »

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Overview

User Rating:
6.5/10   842 votes
MOVIEmeter: ?
Up 2% in popularity this week. See rank & trends on IMDbPro.
Director:
Richard Quine
Writers:
Helen Gurley Brown (book)
Joseph Heller (writer)
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Contact:
View company contact information for Sex and the Single Girl on IMDbPro.
Release Date:
25 December 1964 (USA) more
Genre:
Comedy | Romance more
Tagline:
She wrote the book on love!
Plot:
Using Helen Gurley Brown's book as a jump off point, we follow the adventures of a supermarket tabloid... more | add synopsis
Awards:
1 nomination more
User Comments:
A Game Cast Keeps This Screwball Sex Comedy Afloat and Then Some more

Cast

  (Cast overview, first billed only)

Tony Curtis ... Bob Weston

Natalie Wood ... Helen Gurley Brown

Henry Fonda ... Frank Luther Broderick

Lauren Bacall ... Sylvia Broderick
Mel Ferrer ... Dr. Rudolph (Rudy) DeMeyer
Fran Jeffries ... Gretchen
Leslie Parrish ... Susan

Edward Everett Horton ... The Chief

Larry Storch ... Motorcycle Cop
Stubby Kaye ... Cab Driver 'Speed' Vogel
Howard St. John ... Randall

Otto Kruger ... Dr. Marshall H. Anderson
Max Showalter ... Holmes
William Lanteau ... Sylvester
Helen Kleeb ... Hilda
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Additional Details

Runtime:
110 min | 114 min (TCM print)
Country:
USA
Language:
English
Color:
Color (Technicolor)
Aspect Ratio:
1.85 : 1 more
Sound Mix:
Mono (RCA Sound Recording)
Certification:
Germany:12 (TV rating) | West Germany:18 (original rating) | Finland:S | Sweden:15

Fun Stuff

Trivia:
There are many jokes with references to Jack Lemmon and the picture _Some Like it Hot (1959)_, co-starred by Lemmon and Tony Curtis. Curtis dressed as a woman in one scene of Sex and the Single Girl, is one such reference. more
Quotes:
Frank Luther Broderick: Girls, look! It's my wife. She used to work here. She married the boss. See? If you're nice to me, maybe you can marry me. more
Movie Connections:
Referenced in "The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air: Hex and the Single Guy (#4.7)" (1993) more
Soundtrack:
Sex And The Single Girl more

FAQ

This FAQ is empty. Add the first question.
1 out of 1 people found the following comment useful:-
A Game Cast Keeps This Screwball Sex Comedy Afloat and Then Some, 19 April 2009
7/10
Author: Ed Uyeshima from San Francisco, CA, USA

I actually find this scatterbrained 1964 comedy a surprisingly amusing screwball farce all these years later despite its titillating title. So apparently does director Peyton Reed since he based most of his 2004 comic pastiche, "Down with Love", on the storyline of this movie and less so on any of the Doris Day/Rock Hudson romps of the same era. Regardless, they all have the same brew of conjugal misunderstandings, mistaken identities and leering though never explicit sexuality because those were the days when a woman's virtue would never be compromised for anyone but the right man. Directed by the heavy-handed Richard Quine ("Paris When It Sizzles") and written by Joseph Heller (later the author of "Catch-22") and David R. Schwartz, this ridiculous comedy benefits from a game cast headed by Tony Curtis still riding high from "Some Like It Hot" (which is referred to for easy laughs in the story) and Natalie Wood who shows her comedy chops with dexterity here.

Curtis plays Bob Weston, a sleazy magazine writer for a men's magazine whose editors are intent on exposing Dr. Helen Gurley Brown as a fraud as a sex expert. Author of the best-selling "Sex and the Single Girl", Brown is not at all the clench-jawed celebrity author who wrote the real book and appeared on "The Tonight Show" constantly. Instead, she is a gorgeous, intellectually prodigious 23-year-old who extols female empowerment in the bedroom. Showing off his moral depravity, Weston steals the marital woes of her next-door neighbors, pantyhose magnate Frank Broderick and his acerbic wife Sylvia, and comes to see Dr. Brown as a patient. The rest is predictable but still a good amount of fun. Curtis was still at the top of his game here showing how he can easily elicit laughs from such a vile manipulator, but it's Wood who surprises as Brown. Displaying a nervous but infectious energy that feeds nicely into the two sides of the doctor, she is funny and sexy in a way that she could never quite balance as well again in her career. Witness the hilariously conflicted drunken scene in her apartment for evidence of her talent.

Quine was smart to cast three sharp stars in the key supporting roles - Henry Fonda as the put-upon Frank browbeaten into a sad man by Lauren Bacall pulling all the stops as the shrewish basket case Sylvia is, and Mel Ferrer as Brown's somewhat ambiguous colleague. Add a sultry Fran Jeffries who performs two numbers (including the title tune) for no apparent reason except to sell records, an even sexier Leslie Parrish ("The Manchurian Candidate") as Weston's secretary, and a genuinely funny extended car chase scene, and you have the makings of an under-appreciated sex comedy. The 2009 DVD, part of the six-disc "The Natalie Wood Collection", includes a Warner Brothers cartoon ("Nelly's Folly") and the original theatrical trailer.

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Has anyone noticed, this error. oldpinkfloyd
Number One on my 'I want this on DVD' list iamjohnsname
Jack Lemmon barrababe
name of the artist who did the paintings on the wall? chiarafumo
If u want to see this movie then go to this website donnajunne
Good remake material sgtagee555
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