Director
Joseph L. Mankiewicz
Leading Actors/Actresses
Bette Davis, Anne Baxter, George Sanders
Supporting Actors/Actresses
Celeste Holm, Gary Merrill, Marilyn Monroe, Hugh Marlowe
Genre
Drama
Language
English
Awards
Academy Award Wins: Best Picture, Best Director, Best Supporting Actor (Sanders), Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Sound Mixing, Best Costume Design; Nominated: Best Actress (David & Baxter), Best Supporting Actress (Holm & Ritter), Best Score, Best Editing, Best Cinematography, Best Art Direction
Date of Release
October 13, 1950
Producer
Darryl F. Zanuck
Setting and Context
New York City, 1950
Narrator and Point of View
There are two narrators: Karen and Addison. The point of view shifts around throughout.
Tone and Mood
Darkly comic, dramatic, serious, campy
Protagonist and Antagonist
Protagonist: Margo Channing, Antagonist: Eve Harrington
Major Conflict
The main conflict is whether Eve Harrington's corrupt and opportunistic tactics will allow her to get ahead, and how that will affect Margo.
Climax
The climax occurs when Addison reveals to Eve that he knows the truth about her scandalous past, and blackmails her into being with him.
Foreshadowing
The film begins with the ending, when Eve is receiving the Sarah Siddons award, so we know that a great many controversial things will take place leading up to the ceremony, which becomes a kind of foreshadowing. Additionally, Eve's seduction of Bill is foreshadowed when she makes conversation with him in the living room before his party.
Understatement
Innovations in Filming or Lighting or Camera Techniques
Allusions
Thespis, A Midsummer Nights Dream, the American Civil War, Byron, Clyde Fitch, Little Nell from the Country
Paradox
Once Eve achieves what she set out to acquire (fame) she is isolated and unhappy, even though she is beloved by her community.
Parallelism
Margo and Eve are parallels of one another, in that Eve wants desperately to become like Margo. Then later, Phoebe is a parallel of Eve, a young girl who wants desperately to break into show business. Addison also imagines that he and Eve are parallels of one another. He tells her that they are both "improbable."
