Champagne for Caesar

Ronald Colman, self confessed genius and bookworm extraordinary, lives in a small bungalow with sister Barbara Britton who supports both of them with giving kids piano lessons.

Colman works every now and then because frankly there isn't much call for geniuses at entry level jobs and he intimidates those in power when he does get hired. But one day a particularly arrogant head of a soap manufacturing company dismissed him without an explanation during the interview.

But Colman takes an unusual way of getting even. He goes on the company sponsored quiz program and keeps winning and winning week after week. They're going to owe him big time before he's done.

Champagne for Caesar anticipates the big money quiz show era and the celebrities they spawned by about seven years and the movie about that time, Quiz Show, by over 40. Colman is seemingly the detached man of letters that he was in The Late George Apley. But in fact he turns out to have an exceedingly good grasp on reality and the more mundane treacheries associated with every day life.

Although this is Ronald Colman's film, whenever he's on Vincent Price steals the show totally with his portrayal of the megalomaniacal soap king. It's the kind of outrageous part that actors can really chew the scenery with and Vincent Price had a full course meal.

Celeste Holm plays the femme fatale that Price hires to do Colman in and she's good at her job. But the seemingly unworldly Colman is more than up to her tricks.

Art Linkletter who was just getting nationally known as a radio and television host plays, what else, the host of Price's quiz show. Linkletter did some dramatic television work later on Wagon Train, GE Theater, and Zane Grey Theater, but this is his only feature film role as other than Art Linkletter.

Champagne for Caesar was an independent production by Harry Popkin for United Artists. Though he got great critical reviews, Colman was shorted on his money for this film by Popkin. According to his daughter Juliet's biography of her father, the lawsuit her father brought against Popkin dragged on so long that it got to be something of a family joke. It was still not settled when Colman died in 1958.

Legal problems aside, Champagne for Caesar is one very funny film and should not be missed by fans of Ronald Colman or Vincent Price.

There is no way that you can present a synopsis of this film that can make it appealing. Here is a film that stars Ronald Colman, Vincent Price, Celeste Holm and Art Linkletter???? The plot includes a soap company, a quiz show and a talking parrot. Not only does this film work, it is one of the most riotous comedies ever filmed.

It is the incongruity (and thus the brilliance) of the casting that makes this successful. Colman who is so well known for his romantic voice and looks and just coming off as Oscar winning performance in the dark but brilliant "A Double Life" plays Bouregard Bottomley, a man who knows "everything about everything", except how to get a job. He goes to the Milady Soap Company and is almost hired except he had the audacity to make a joke in front of company President Birnbridge Waters, played by Vincent Price. It seems that Milady sponsors a quiz program and Bottomley decides to go on as a contestant and take Price for all he is worth and thereby hangs this uproarious tale.

For all of the dramatic accomplishments by the principals, Colman, Price and Holm are tremendously funny with Price as a particular standout. He goes way over the top (similar to James Cagney in the equally as funny "One, Two, Three") but he is perfect.

The real surprise is Art Linkletter. Having made his reputation as a rather bland variety show host in radio and the early days of television, he comes off very effectively as both the quiz show and the romantic lead. This was his only acting appearance and it is too bad. He was very good.

This film demands several viewings. Often you are laughing so hard you miss some great lines.

The Champaign in the title does not go solely to Caesar (a talking parrot). It goes to all involved with this classic. Here's to you.

This offbeat comedy is both entertaining and interesting. Ronald Coleman is sympathetic and amusing as the meek genius who threatens to drive a popular quiz show out of business, the rest of the cast helps out quite a bit, and the story is pleasantly goofy and unpredictable. As a satire on the 50's quiz shows, it is even more interesting in light of the more recent trivia show fads.

Coleman's low-key approach works well as the trivia genius Beauregard, and he is complemented very well by the more exaggerated performances of Celeste Holm, Art Linkletter, and especially Vincent Price, all of whom get some fine moments of their own. While the story is deliberately over-the-top, it is set up well, and while it is meant solely as light entertainment, it does have a little substance in it, too. There's a lot to like, and it makes for an enjoyable way to spend an hour and a half.

Why this movie is not considered up there with the great comedies of the 1950's is beyond me - I mean, Some Like It Hot is funny for two viewings, tops. There are scenes in this movie that never ever fail to make me laugh, and I've seen the film six or seven times by now. All of these are scenes with Vincent Price, who gives what is probably among the top five comedic performances in the history of American film here -- at least if you consider those by non-comedians. It's no surprise that Price could go over the top, as he did in all those Roger Corman horror movies, but here, it's expressly for comic effect (rather than camp effect -- not the same thing). He was at a transitional point in his career: he was through playing hunky-but-wimpy second male leads and tormented romantic heroes, and was soon to embark on his second career as Mr. Drive-In Horror Movie Star. So this is really his only true comedy performance, and he is brilliant as corporate nutjob Burnbridge Waters.

Everybody else here is great*: Ronald Colman is simply perfect as Beauregard Bottomley, an unemployable with a genius range IQ. (I am of the opinion that Alex Trebek wanted to grow up to be Ronald Colman -- not necessarily as this character, just in general). Celeste Holm is great as always as temptress Flame O'Neill, hired by Waters to rattle Colman's character to the point where he starts losing on the quiz show. She's very much in the tradition of Carole Lombard: beautiful and a super actress in anything, very adept at comedy and always intensely likable. Barbara Britton as Bottomley's sister Gwenn is another charmer, cute as a bug's ear.

*Then there's Art Linkletter: OK, he's great as the quiz show host -- he did that for a living in real life. But there's something kinda creepy about him, plus he's no matinée idol, and I always feel a little skeeved at his scenes romancing Barbara Britton. It's taken as gospel that no unattached lead character remain unattached at the end of a movie, but couldn't they have paired her off with one of Waters' employees, a cab driver, ANYBODY? OR could they have hired some second-tier pretty boy to play Linkletter's role? This is my only quibble with the film, and it's why I rate it a 9 rather than a 10.

It has always amazed me what a wonderful job of casting was done on this film. Ronald Colman in a departure from his normal films, Celeste Holm as the vamp with a giggle/laugh that would keep anyone awake, Vincent Price, Art Linkletter and Barbara Britton doing what they each do so splendidly. This film was quite underrated originally, but true film buffs will enjoy the comedic plot and the great acting.