How to Steal a Million

How to Steal a Million (William Wyler, 1966) Writer Harry Kurnitz (who the story for Hatari!, the novel for A Shot in the Dark, and the screenwriter for Witness for the Prosecution and a couple entries of the "Thin Man" series) could be counted on to deliver a solid story that never really amounted to what it promised...that is, other than to entertain and entertain mightily. Especially if all the elements were in place—good photography, cracker-jack actors, an ornate location or two. He didn't write important pictures. He wrote fluff. Good fluff. That would satisfy audiences, and make critics suspicious that they were being conned.

The story goes that director William Wyler, after directing Audrey Hepburn to an Oscar for Roman Holiday, wanted to re-team her with co-star Gregory Peck for another rompish movie, this time set in Paris. In the forseeable future, however, Hepburn and Wyler worked on The Children's Hour together, Wyler had directed a little film called Ben-Hur, and Peck had won his Oscar for To Kill a Mockingbird. Somehow, the elements wouldn't gel until Wyler put together Hepburn and Peter O'Toole—who was toiling in an endless stream of drama parts, and was probably attracted to the idea of something lighter for a change.

What the fuss is all about...

The story concerns one Charles Bonnet (Hugh Griffith), whose French estate contains some of the world's most renowned art treasures, and who, also, maybe coincidentally, is also one of the world's most unknown art forgers. His daughter Nicole (Hepburn, all Givenchy'd up and no place to go—O'Toole's character makes a crack about it later in the movie) is constantly worried that Dad is going to go too far some day and the Paris gendarmes will come knocking at their door and the family's wealth and reputation will be as worthless as one of Daddy's forgeries.

Wyler, exploiting the film's wide-screen presentation,

must really love that staircase.

So, imagine her dismay when guards, police and armored cars come to the drive-way. Charles assures her that he is merely lending one of his collection, "The Cellini Venus", to the Kléber-Lafayette Museum* for display and the heavy armory is for safe passage. Except for one tiny detail—that "Cellini Venus" is a forgery, too, sculpted by Charles' father and the model for it being his mother. What's more, it is probably more susceptible to being realized as a forgery than one of the family's many paintings. Her father is not worried, and the small Venus is whisked away for display. Nicole is not so reassured.

It doesn't help that while father Charles attends a celebratory soiree at the museum, Nicole** must confront a burglar, one Simon Dermott (O'Toole), caught in the act of examining one of the Bonnet Van Gogh's. In a tuxedo, he's exceptionally well-dressed for burgling, a move no doubt inspired by Charles' absence for the night. But, he's charming enough to be able to disarm the situation, although she does manage to ruin the line of sight by accidentally shooting him in the arm. "Oh, it's just a flesh wound" Nicole scolds. "But it's MY flesh!" he retorts.

Nicole should be worried. Dermott is something of a fraud himself. Plus, the Bonnet household is being circled by art dealer DeSolnay (Charles Boyer), who has decided to look into the Bonnet provenance and have it investigated. And a rather eccentrically driven American wheeler-dealer (Eli Wallach) wants to obtain the "Venus" by any means necessary—including marrying Nicole. 

And then, there's the major complication: insurance. Charles Bonnet is not worried about the Venus being determined a forgery, as he is merely loaning it out and it need not be examined for authenticity. He thought. But, as the museum has to insure the statue from theft, it must go through the formality of a "technical examination, which will expose the fakery. Bonnet has already signed the papers, inadvertently giving the Museum permission to its study, so surely that will expose the family.

Nicole then decides—mad-cap that she is—to hire Demott (the only burglar she knows) to steal the statue before it can be found out. It takes about an hour of cute dialogue, spry encounters, several costume changes and that nearly lethal incident of "meet-cute" before we get there. The rest of the movie documents the long, drawn-out robbery which relies on false alarms—and we see all of them.

There is magnetism involved among the principal actors—Hepburn pirouettes in her own spotlight, and O'Toole observes, amused. Wyler, on the other hand, is content to make sure we see how expansive the sets are, like he was still filming Ben-Hur. Those sets, however, never seem more than nattily-dressed cavernous sound-stages (his next film would be the equally ornate Funny Girl). How to Steal a Million is a trifle, with all the consistency of just-applied meringue, and with as much confectioner's sugar.

One interesting thing to ponder is what might have been. For the role Wallach eventually played, Walter Mathau (who was in Hepburn's Charade and starred on Broadway in Kurnitz's "A Shot in the Dark" was approached but wanted too much money. Cast instead was George C. Scott, who, unfortunately, turned up late for his first day of shooting...like, after lunch. Wyler, who was already worried that O'Toole and Griffith, two notorious drinkers, were in danger of derailing the project, would not abide such behavior in a third, and promptly fired Scott, which, apparently, greatly upset Hepburn.

 

One can only imagine...

Face it. Whatever the plot, this is what audiences wanted to see.

 

* It's fictional, but then so is The Cellini Venus...

** Interestingly, she is again caught in her bed reading a book involving Alfred Hitchcock (as was also the case in Roman Holiday). I don't know if this was a nod to his fellow director by Wyler, or if Hepburn was attempting to court Hitch to appear in one of his films (although the film Charade is considered the next best thing), but the two never collaborated. Maybe because Hepburn would not have let Hitchcock decide what she wore.