WHAT’S PLAYING
IN THE THEATER
ON THE SCREEN
17
DECEMBER 2229, 2021
‘THE APARTMENT’
The 1960 fi lm “The Apartment” was nominated for 10
Academy Awards in 1961.
It won:
• Best Picture
• Best Director (Billy Wilder)
• Best Writing, Story and Screenplay (Billy Wilder and I.A.L.
Diamond)
• Best Art Direction-Set Decoration, Black-and-White (Alexan-
dre Trauner, Edward G. Boyle)
• Best Film Editing (Daniel Mandell)
The other nominations were:
• Best Actor in a Leading Role (Jack Lemmon)
• Best Actress in a Leading Role (Shirley MacLaine)
• Best Actor in a Supporting Role (Jack Kruschen)
• Best Cinematography, Black-and-White (Joseph LaShelle)
• Best Sound (Gordon Sawyer)
There aren’t words adequate
enough to describe how ador-
able Baxter is, nor words ap-
propriate enough for what a jerk
Sheldrake is.
The girl in the love triangle is
Fran Kubelik (Shirley MacLaine),
a meek, fouled up (her words)
elevator operator in the same
building. She’s also single. Bax-
ter has a crush on her, but she’s
having an aff air with Sheldrake
on the side — his latest “ring-
a-ding-ding” girl. She’s actu-
ally trying to call it off with him,
though rather unsuccessfully.
Baxter knows none of this, or at
least not that it’s Sheldrake she’s
seeing.
In the meantime, several
disreputable guys are trying to
crawl up the offi ce’s corporate
ladder. Philanderers themselves,
they use Baxter’s apartment for
their hookups. Baxter provides a
key that fl oats around the offi ce,
keeping a schedule of the nightly
shenanigans, which lead his
neighbors to think that he’s quite
a busy guy — playboy-wise. In
the hopes of also making his
own climb to an executive fl oor,
he reluctantly lets Sheldrake in
on the “key club.” Oops.
A few of these actors also
went on to more genial roles
— Ray Walston (“My Favorite
Martian”) and David White (Larry
Tate on “Bewitched”).
“The Apartment” is a snap-
shot of offi ce life in the 1950s
and 1960s: Rows of desks
topped with adding machines,
ink blotters, in-boxes and
Rolodexes; entire fl oors bor-
dered by lengthy hat shelves
and coat racks; errand boys
delivering messages; and eleva-
tor girls waiting to take you up
or down. And then there’s the
offi ce Christmas party, where
thousands of employees from
dozens of fl oors gather in almost
barbarous merriment with free-
fl owing everything. Does anyone
party like that anymore?
Santa even makes an ap-
pearance. He’s in a bar, soused
after fi nishing his Christmas Eve
duties, but — he’s there.
With topics of infi delity, sexual
harassment and (mild spoiler
alert) an attempted suicide, con-
troversy surrounded the movie’s
release. However, the fi lm was,
and remains, a popular success
— mostly because none of those
things win out in the end. Out
of 10 nominations at the 1960
Academy Awards, “The Apart-
ment” won fi ve, including Best
Picture and Best Director to Billy
Wilder. Lemmon and MacLaine
also won Golden Globe awards.
Interested? Here are some
food suggestions from the
movie to prepare in advance,
ambiance-wise: cheese crack-
ers, Chinese food (specifi cally,
sweet-and sour shrimp) and
spaghetti (tennis racket option-
al). Drinks: daiquiris, martinis,
champagne and Tom and Jerry,
a one-time popular Christmas
cocktail. Like fruitcake? It’s
there too.
Make it a party and gather
some friends for a game of gin
rummy during, before or after
the movie.
And here are a couple other
movies to consider: “Grand Ho-
tel” and “The Music Man.” Both
have noteworthy mentions in
“The Apartment.”
One last tip from this devoted
fan: Start the movie right at
10 p.m. so that the New Year’s
Eve scene near the end will hap-
pen right at midnight. And have
a party hat and horn handy —
celebration-wise.
(Want to know what the “wise”
is all about? Watch the movie
and fi nd out!)
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