{"id":11662,"date":"2010-07-09T06:00:49","date_gmt":"2010-07-09T10:00:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.moviefanfare.com\/?p=11662"},"modified":"2013-01-10T19:43:09","modified_gmt":"2013-01-11T00:43:09","slug":"a-letter-to-three-wives","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.moviefanfare.com\/?p=11662","title":{"rendered":"A Letter to Three Wives"},"content":{"rendered":"


<\/a>\"a_letter_to_three_wives_movie_poster\"<\/p>\n

One Saturday morning, Deborah Bishop (Jeanne Crain<\/a>), Lora Mae Hollingsway (Linda Darnell<\/a>), and Rita Phipps (Ann Sothern<\/a>), get together to take a bunch of children on a boat trip and a picnic.\u00a0 Only problem is, there was supposed to be a fourth woman with them, Addie Ross (played by a never-seen, only heard, Celeste Holm<\/a>).\u00a0 Just before Deborah, Lora, and Rita leave on the boat, a messenger delivers a letter from Addie in which she says that she has run off with one of their husbands, but doesn\u2019t say which one.\u00a0 As the day progresses, each woman thinks back to an incident that could have made their husband want to leave them and how Addie Ross plays into each scenario.<\/p>\n

Deborah remembers the first night she went to the local country club and met her husband Brad\u2019s (Jeffrey Lynn<\/a>) friends.\u00a0 They live in the small town where Brad grew up and Deborah is worried about being accepted in the tight-knight community.\u00a0 Her hair is a mess, her dress is out-of-date, and she has a few too many martinis.\u00a0 Before going to the country club, Rita tries to reassure Deborah and helps her alter her unfashionable dress.\u00a0 Unfortunately, while dancing at the country club, Deborah has a bit of a wardrobe malfunction in front of everybody.\u00a0 She\u2019s convinced she couldn\u2019t possibly stand up next to the eternally smooth Addie.<\/p>\n

Next, Rita recalls a disastrous dinner party.\u00a0 Rita is a radio writer and is married to George Phipps (Kirk Douglas<\/a>), a teacher who has difficulty accepting that his wife is the primary breadwinner.\u00a0 She arranges a dinner party for her bosses, during which she planned to offer George a job.\u00a0 Rita wants George to be dressed to the nines and ready to impress.\u00a0 George doesn\u2019t understand why she\u2019s so bent on impressing her boss and doesn\u2019t cooperate.\u00a0 Then a delivery comes for George, a record from Addie, and Rita realizes she completely forgot George\u2019s birthday.\u00a0 Once Rita\u2019s bosses arrive, they are more interested in spending hours listening to radio programs than they are in dinner.\u00a0 Before leaving, Rita\u2019s boss asks George for his opinion on the radio programs and he is quite brutally honest.\u00a0 After the bosses leave, Rita and George get into a fight over Rita\u2019s career ambitions.<\/p>\n

Lora doesn\u2019t recall one single incident, rather she realizes the entire basis for their marriage is enough to make her husband, Porter (Paul Douglas<\/a>),\u00a0 want to leave.\u00a0 Porter owns a chain of department stores and met Lora when she was working for him.\u00a0 At the time, Lora was living in a house by the railroad tracks with her mother and sister and was determined to marry up.\u00a0 Porter had already been married and divorced and wasn\u2019t looking to get married again.\u00a0 But Lora refuses to have any kind of relationship with him unless he\u2019s willing to give her what she wants.\u00a0 Although Porter could very easily have Addie, he agrees to marry Lora.<\/p>\n

A Letter to Three Wives <\/a>is the very definition of an under-appreciated classic.\u00a0 Although it was a Best Picture Oscar nominee and earned Joseph L. Mankiewicz<\/a> Oscars for Best Director and Best Screenplay, I really don\u2019t hear much about this one.\u00a0 That\u2019s really unfortunate because it\u2019s an excellent and unique movie.\u00a0 I don\u2019t recall ever seeing this plot ever being ripped off and used in another movie.\u00a0 It was very well written and has a good twist at the end.\u00a0 The acting was great and it\u2019s just a movie that I\u2019d gladly watch again and again.\u00a0 I just can\u2019t figure out why this movie isn\u2019t talked about more.\u00a0 Maybe it was eclipsed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz\u2019s next movie, All About Eve<\/a>.\u00a0 But whatever the reason, if you ever have the chance to see it, I would highly recommend it.<\/p>\n

Angela is a classic film enthusiast from Detroit with a degree in Television Production.\u00a0 She runs the blog The Hollywood Revue<\/a> and is the co-author of Cooking With the Classics: Recipes Inspired by Classic Films.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

One Saturday morning, Deborah Bishop (Jeanne Crain), Lora Mae Hollingsway (Linda Darnell), and Rita Phipps (Ann Sothern), get together to take a bunch of children on a boat trip and a picnic.\u00a0 Only problem is, there was supposed to be…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9693,"featured_media":11663,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[1442,2084],"coauthors":[5336],"class_list":["post-11662","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-movie-articles","tag-1940s-movies","tag-kirk-douglas"],"yoast_head":"\nA Letter to Three Wives (1949): A Classic Movie Review<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"A Letter to Three Wives the 1949 Drama starring Jeanne Crain, Kirk Douglas & Jeffrey Lynn is reviewed. 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