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SEX AND THE SINGLE GIRL (1964) - August 25th

In a summer that gave us a 21st-century look at female sexual independence (as defined by Prada and Dior, anyway) with Sex and the City 2, spending two hours talking sex with Natalie Wood and Tony Curtis in 1964 seems downright quaint.

The film is adapted from Helen Gurley Brown’s bestselling 1962 novel, though that’s a bit like suggesting the movie Milk is based on the dairy product. What Warner Brothers really wanted was the wonderfully marketable title - Sex and the Single Girl.

Tony Curtis is a magazine writer - and I’m using the term “magazine” loosely. Also the word “writer.” He digs up dirt for a scandal sheet. His editors - played with slippery, unethical brilliance by Edward Everett Horton and Howard St. John - boast of the publication’s utter lack of standards. “Thank you, Bob, for living down to my expectations,” Horton cheerfully tells Curtis at an editorial meeting. “Keep up the bad work,” he says to him later.

Their celebration of ethical ignorance is not without purpose. The magazine is investigating whether Natalie Wood, playing Brown, is a virgin. It’s relevant because she’s just written a book about sex and Curtis wants to uncover whether the author has any hands-on experience.

Despite the farce, the script is insightful. Curtis and St. John must pay to get water out of the faucet, dry their hands and use the mirror. It’s corporate America squeezing every penny it can out of us, even in the men’s room.

Adding gravity in supporting roles, Lauren Bacall and Henry Fonda play Curtis’ neighbors - a couple married ten years. The scene where they do the twist gave me a rare burst of confi dence. I found something I might do better than Henry Fonda - dance.

The film lacks the sexual female empowerment of Brown’s novel but it’s still a charming reminder of a time in Hollywood when a girl having a one-night stand meant a girl with one nightstand next to her bed. Take that, Carrie Bradshaw.

by Ben Mankiewicz



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