Don't Make a Scene: All About Eve

The Story: One looks for inspiration for these things. But, one shouldn't wait for it.

So, I've been irritating recent lunch companions and fellow podcast panelists for inspiration on Scenes to do for Sunday. It changes things up and it's always nice to present somebody else's ideas rather than restricting it to the things coming from my head. I think that gets dull...for me and for you.

While a few things are in the works (I've still got a couple of the Premiere Magazine transcriptions to do but it's less than five, now), here's one of the ones suggested to me...from Howard Casner of the Pop Art podcast (check it out), who suggested "the scene after the audition" from All About Eve.

There a couple of those, but I knew what he meant. Howard loves Eve, as I do. And one of my favorite scenes involves the unseen audition of Miss Caswell (Marilyn Monroe) "a graduate of the Copacabana school of the dramatic arts." Our Heroine, Margo Channing, is making good on a promise to read with Miss Caswell, but Margo being Margo (instead of one of the roles she puts on) is late for it. I remember this scene for the wicked take-down of television at the end of it, one of the great exit lines in All About Eve.

And there are so many of them! The writing in Eve is top-shelf. Which is why when I mentioned after Howard's suggestion that I'd already done five scenes from All About Eve. That got a reaction from people, not because I was complaining (I wasn't) but they didn't think there could be five scenes to do from that one movie. For the record, here they are:

All About Eve I (Marilyn)

All About Eve II (Enter Eve)

All About Eve III (Fasten Your Safety Belts)

All About Eve IV (Stairway Talk)

All About Eve V (Killer to Killer)

But, there are so many good scenes in this movie, I could do more...many more.

 

In fact...

 

Maybe Howard was actually referring to the very next scene, "the typhoon" the script refers to where Margo marches into the theater and proceeds to spit venom and vinegar at anyone within range, not unlike one of those Clint Eastwood shoot-outs he used to do. That scene has so many bon-mots it's a highlight reel in and of itself. Maybe that's the one.

 

Next year...

 

The Set-up: Margo Channing (Bette Davis) has just had a party and it's back to business—she has been asked by her play's producer to help with the audition of the latest protege of critic Addison DeWitt (George Sanders). But, running true to form, she is running late. Margo always seems to be late...

 

Action.

 

 

 

EXT. N. Y. THEATRE· STREET - DAY- (SHOOT WITH DOUBLE) 

Margo gets out of a cab in front of the theatre and goes in. 

It's a Friday afternoon - no performance. :

MARGO'S VOICE What was-it the wise man said - "this, too, will pass away"? Two weeks later - the day of the audition - all was well with Bill and me, the world and me --- 

INT. LOBBY AND FOYER - DAY - CURRAN THEATRE 309 

Margo comes from the street through the lobby (a few people buying tickets) and into the deserted foyer. 

She spots Addison sprawled on one of the sofas. 

MARGO Why so remote, Addison? 

MARGO I should think you'd be at the side of your protegee, lending her moral support.

ADDISON Miss Caswell, at the moment, is where I can lend no support - moral or otherwise. 

MARGO The ladies'- shall we say - lounge? 

ADDISON Being violently 111 to her tummy. 

MARGO It's good luck before an audition. She'll be all right once it starts. 

She heads for the auditorium. 

ADDISON Miss Caswell got lucky too late. The audition is over. 

MARGO (stops) Over? It can't be. I've come to read with her. I promised Max. 

ADDISON The audition was called for 2:30. It is now nearly four.

MARGO (lightly) It is really? I must start wearing a watch, I never do, you know...

MARGO Who read with Miss Caswell? Bill?  

(he shakes his head)  

MARGO Lloyd?  

(he shakes his head) 

MARGO Well, it couldn't have been Max! Who? 

ADDISON Naturally enough, your understudy. 

MARGO I consider it highly unnatural to allow a girl in an advanced state of pregnancy - 

ADDISON I refer to your new and unpregnant understudy. Eve Harrington. 

MARGO Eve! 

MARGO My understudy...

ADDISON (keenly) Didn't you know? 

MARGO (quickly) Of course I knew. 

ADDISON It just slipped your mind. 

A moment of silence.

MARGO How...how was Miss Caswell? 

ADDISON Frankly, I don't remember. 

MARGO Just slipped your mind. 

ADDISON Completely. 

ADDISON Nor, I am sure, could anyone else present tell you how Miss Caswell read or whether Miss Caswell read or rode a pogo stick..

MARGO Was she that bad? 

As Addison speaks, he rises with excitement. 

ADDISON Margo, as you know, I have lived in the Theatre as a Trappist monk lives in his faith. I have no other world, no other life - 

ADDISON ...and once in a great while I experience that moment of Revelation for which all true believers wait and pray. 

ADDISON You were one. Jeanne Eagels another...Paula Wessely...Hayes - there are others, three or four.

ADDISON Eve Harrington will be among them..

MARGO (flatly) I take it she read well. 

ADDISON It wasn't a reading, it was a performance. Brilliant, vivid, something made of music and fire...

MARGO How nice. 

ADDISON In time she'll be what you are. 

MARGO A mass of music and fire. 

MARGO That's me. An old Kazoo and some sparklers. 

MARGO Tell me - was Bill swept away, too, or were you too full of Revelation to notice? 

ADDISON Bill didn't say - but Lloyd was beside himself. He listened to his play as if someone else had written it, he said, it sounded so fresh, so new, so full of meaning...

MARGO How nice for Lloyd. 

MARGO And how nice for Eve. 

MARGO How nice for everybody. 

Addison, of course, knows exactly what he is doing. He senses the approaching typhoon, he whips it up..

ADDISON Eve was incredibly modest. 

ADDISON She insisted that no credit was due her, that Lloyd felt as he did only because she read lines exactly as he had written them. 

MARGO The implication being that I have not been reading them as written. 

ADDISON To the best of my recollection, neither your name nor your performance entered the conversation. 

Miss Caswell appears  uncertainly, in the b.g.

ADDISON Ah, Miss Caswell...

ADDISON Feeling better, my dear? 

MISS CASWELL Like I just swam the English Channel. 

MISS CASWELL Now what? 

ADDISON Your next move, it seems to me, should be toward television.

Margo, abruptly, starts for the auditorium. 

Addison smiles. He takes Miss Caswell's arm. 

MISS CASWELL Tell me this. Do they have auditions for television? 

ADDISON That is all television is, my dear. Nothing but auditions. 

He leads her toward the street.

 

All About Eve

Words by Joseph L. Mankiewicz

Pictures by Milton R. Krasner and Joseph L. Mankiewicz

All About Eve is available on DVD and Blu-Ray from Fox Home Entertainment and The Criterion Collection.