''Myra Breckinridge'' is a 1970 American
comedy film
A comedy film is a category of film which emphasizes humor. These films are designed to make the audience laugh through amusement. Films in this style traditionally have a happy ending (black comedy being an exception). Comedy is one of the ol ...
based on
Gore Vidal
Eugene Luther Gore Vidal (; born Eugene Louis Vidal, October 3, 1925 – July 31, 2012) was an American writer and public intellectual known for his epigrammatic wit, erudition, and patrician manner. Vidal was bisexual, and in his novels and ...
's 1968
novel of the same name. The film was directed by
Michael Sarne, and featured
Raquel Welch
Jo Raquel Welch ( Tejada; September 5, 1940) is an American actress.
She first won attention for her role in ''Fantastic Voyage'' (1966), after which she won a contract with 20th Century Fox. They lent her contract to the British studio Hammer ...
in the title role. It also starred
John Huston
John Marcellus Huston ( ; August 5, 1906 – August 28, 1987) was an American film director, screenwriter, actor and visual artist. He wrote the screenplays for most of the 37 feature films he directed, many of which are today considered ...
as Buck Loner,
Mae West
Mae West (born Mary Jane West; August 17, 1893 – November 22, 1980) was an American stage and film actress, playwright, screenwriter, singer, and sex symbol whose entertainment career spanned over seven decades. She was known for her breezy ...
as Leticia Van Allen,
Farrah Fawcett
Farrah Leni Fawcett (born Ferrah Leni Fawcett; February 2, 1947 – June 25, 2009) was an American actress. A four-time Primetime Emmy Award nominee and six-time Golden Globe Award nominee, Fawcett rose to international fame when she playe ...
,
Rex Reed
Rex Taylor Reed (born October 2, 1938) is an American film critic, occasional actor, and television host. He writes the column "On the Town with Rex Reed" for ''The New York Observer''.
Early life
Reed was born on October 2, 1938, in Fort Wort ...
, Roger Herren, and
Roger C. Carmel.
Tom Selleck
Thomas William Selleck (; born January 29, 1945) is an American actor. His breakout role was playing private investigator Thomas Magnum in the television series ''Magnum, P.I.'' (1980–1988), for which he received five Emmy Award nominations f ...
made his film debut in a small role as one of Leticia's "studs."
Theadora Van Runkle was costume designer for the film, though
Edith Head
Edith Head (October 28, 1897 – October 24, 1981) was an American costume designer who won a record eight Academy Awards for Best Costume Design between 1949 and 1973, making her the most awarded woman in the Academy's history. Head is consi ...
designed West's costumes.
Like the novel, the picture follows the exploits of Myra Breckinridge (née Myron), a transgender woman who has undergone a
sex change
Sex change is a natural or artificial process in which an individual's sex is changed.
Sex change may also refer to:
Biology and medicine
*Sex reassignment therapy
*Sex reassignment surgery
*Sequential hermaphroditism, a phenomenon whereby some ...
operation. Claiming to be her own widow, she manipulates her uncle into giving her a position at his
acting school, where she attempts to usurp
Hollywood
Hollywood usually refers to:
* Hollywood, Los Angeles, a neighborhood in California
* Hollywood, a metonym for the cinema of the United States
Hollywood may also refer to:
Places United States
* Hollywood District (disambiguation)
* Hollywood, ...
's
social order
The term social order can be used in two senses: In the first sense, it refers to a particular system of social structures and institutions. Examples are the ancient, the feudal, and the capitalist social order. In the second sense, social order ...
by introducing
femdom
A dominatrix (; ) or femdom is a woman who takes the dominant role in BDSM activities. A dominatrix can be of any sexual orientation, but this does not necessarily limit the genders of her submissive partners. Dominatrices are known for inflic ...
into the curriculum.
The picture was controversial for its sexual explicitness (including acts like
female-on-male rape), but it, unlike the novel, received little to no critical praise and has been cited as one of the
worst films ever made.
Plot
Myron Breckinridge flies to
Copenhagen
Copenhagen ( or .; da, København ) is the capital and most populous city of Denmark, with a proper population of around 815.000 in the last quarter of 2022; and some 1.370,000 in the urban area; and the wider Copenhagen metropolitan ar ...
to get a sex-change operation, becoming the beautiful Myra. Returning to America, Myra goes to her uncle Buck Loner's acting school, where she pretends to be her own widow and claims that it was Myron's will that she receive half the school, or $500,000; when Loner demurs, she asks that she be given a teaching job there to provide for herself. Buck reluctantly agrees, while launching an investigation into the veracity of Myra's claims.
Although she is ostensibly assigned an
etiquette
Etiquette () is the set of norms of personal behaviour in polite society, usually occurring in the form of an ethical code of the expected and accepted social behaviours that accord with the conventions and norms observed and practised by a ...
class, Myra instead philosophizes about the
semiotics
Semiotics (also called semiotic studies) is the systematic study of sign processes ( semiosis) and meaning making. Semiosis is any activity, conduct, or process that involves signs, where a sign is defined as anything that communicates something ...
of the
Golden Age of Hollywood
Golden means made of, or relating to gold.
Golden may also refer to:
Places United Kingdom
*Golden, in the parish of Probus, Cornwall
*Golden Cap, Dorset
*Golden Square, Soho, London
*Golden Valley, a valley on the River Frome in Gloucestershir ...
while also introducing concepts of
femdom
A dominatrix (; ) or femdom is a woman who takes the dominant role in BDSM activities. A dominatrix can be of any sexual orientation, but this does not necessarily limit the genders of her submissive partners. Dominatrices are known for inflic ...
into the curriculum. In debates with Myron—who physically manifests to Myra to discuss their plan—it is revealed that Myra has come to the academy with the intention of "the destruction of the last vestigial traces of traditional manhood in the race in order to realign the sexes, thus reducing population while increasing human happiness and preparing for its next stage.”
On campus, Myra becomes obsessed with a pair of young lovers named Rusty and Mary Ann, whom she believes embody all the traits of American
gender norms
A gender role, also known as a sex role, is a social role encompassing a range of behaviors and attitudes that are generally considered acceptable, appropriate, or desirable for a person based on that person's sex. Gender roles are usually cente ...
. One night, on the pretext of arranging for him to undergo a physical exam, Myra ties Rusty to a table and anally rapes him with a
strap on. The assault causes Rusty to abandon Mary Ann. Myra uses the pair's breakup to move in on Mary Ann herself, encouraging her to experiment with
bisexuality
Bisexuality is a romantic or sexual attraction or behavior toward both males and females, or to more than one gender. It may also be defined to include romantic or sexual attraction to people regardless of their sex or gender identity, whic ...
. Myra's pursuit of Rusty and Mary Ann is paralleled with the life of Leticia van Allen, a female casting agent who habitually seduces the young men who come to her for auditions. Leticia and Myra briefly cross paths when Leticia comes to the school scouting for talent. Following her assault of Rusty, Myra sends him to Leticia, who claims Rusty as her own lover.
Buck continues his investigation, ultimately uncovering evidence that Myron never died and that no death certificate exists for him. Confronted with the truth, Myra admits to the truth and strips naked before a horrified Buck; Buck's response indicates that Myra did not have her
testes
A testicle or testis (plural testes) is the male reproductive gland or gonad in all bilaterians, including humans. It is homologous to the female ovary. The functions of the testes are to produce both sperm and androgens, primarily testoster ...
removed during her sex change.
Myra continues her pursuit of Mary Ann, who turns her down, telling her that she wishes she were a man. The next day, the manifestation of Myron—claiming that Myra has become too ambitious—runs her down in a car.
Myron awakens in the hospital from the beginning of the film, where it's indicated he has been admitted for a car accident, not gender reassignment; his nurse is Mary Ann. Looking at his bedside table, Myron sees a magazine featuring an article on Raquel Welch.
Cast
Production
Development
Film rights were sold for a reported $750,000 including a percentage of the profits and a fee covering Gore Vidal writing the screenplay.
Vidal wrote a draft, but the job was ultimately assigned to
David Giler
David Kevin Giler (July 23, 1943 – December 19, 2020) was an American filmmaker who was active in the film industry since the early 1960s.
Career Television
Giler's father Bernie (1908–1967) was a writer. Giler began his career collaborating ...
, who wrote a draft in three weeks. Vidal told Giler how much he liked the draft.
Michael Sarne had just made ''
Joanna
Joanna is a feminine given name deriving from from he, יוֹחָנָה, translit=Yôḥānāh, lit=God is gracious. Variants in English include Joan (given name), Joan, Joann, Joanne (given name), Joanne, and Johanna. Other forms of the name in ...
''.
20th Century Fox
20th Century Studios, Inc. (previously known as 20th Century Fox) is an American film production company headquartered at the Fox Studio Lot in the Century City area of Los Angeles. As of 2019, it serves as a film production arm of Walt Dis ...
's head of production, Dick Zanuck, said "he came to me when we had two lousy scripts and said he knew how to do it. He had some good ideas."
Zanuck introduced Sarne to the film's producer, Robert Fryer, who was so impressed that the studio hired Sarne to write a script. The final draft of the script would be the tenth.
The original director was
Bud Yorkin
Alan David "Bud" Yorkin (February 22, 1926 – August 18, 2015) was an American film and television producer, director, screenwriter, and actor.
Biography
Yorkin was born in Washington, Pennsylvania, to Jewish parents. He earned a degree ...
. Producer Jim Cresson said "we thought he would play it too safe" and the studio ended up giving the job of directing to Sarne.
There were months of speculation over who would play the title role. Raquel Welch was cast in July 1969.
The next major casting was
Mae West
Mae West (born Mary Jane West; August 17, 1893 – November 22, 1980) was an American stage and film actress, playwright, screenwriter, singer, and sex symbol whose entertainment career spanned over seven decades. She was known for her breezy ...
, accepting her first film role since 1943. (She claimed to have turned down ''
Pal Joey'' and ''
The Art of Love''.) West was introduced to producer
Robert Fryer
Robert Sherwood Fryer (November 18, 1920 - May 28, 2000) was an American theatrical and film producer. Beginning in the early 1950s, Robert Fryer produced and co-produced many Broadway hits. Some of his most notable theatrical productions includ ...
via
George Cukor
George Dewey Cukor (; July 7, 1899 – January 24, 1983) was an American film director and film producer. He mainly concentrated on comedies and literary adaptations. His career flourished at RKO when David O. Selznick, the studio's Head of ...
. "It's a return, not a comeback," said West. "I've never been away, just busy."
The producers allowed her to rewrite her dialogue and sing some songs.
She was paid $350,000. She was also responsible for getting a then-unknown
Tom Selleck
Thomas William Selleck (; born January 29, 1945) is an American actor. His breakout role was playing private investigator Thomas Magnum in the television series ''Magnum, P.I.'' (1980–1988), for which he received five Emmy Award nominations f ...
cast as one of her studs in the film.
Farrah Fawcett
Farrah Leni Fawcett (born Ferrah Leni Fawcett; February 2, 1947 – June 25, 2009) was an American actress. A four-time Primetime Emmy Award nominee and six-time Golden Globe Award nominee, Fawcett rose to international fame when she playe ...
was also an unknown when she was cast in this movie.
Shooting
Filming was laden with controversy due to
Michael Sarne being granted complete control over the project. Sarne quickly went over budget due to his unorthodox techniques, which included spending up to seven hours at a time by himself, "thinking", leaving the cast to wait around on set for him to return so that filming could commence.
Additionally, Sarne spent several days filming tables of food for a dream sequence which, in addition to being non-essential to the plot, appears in the film for only a few seconds.
[
According to many accounts, Sarne encouraged bickering among cast members. After the failure of this film, he was never asked by an American studio to direct another film.
There were also reports of conflicts between ]Raquel Welch
Jo Raquel Welch ( Tejada; September 5, 1940) is an American actress.
She first won attention for her role in ''Fantastic Voyage'' (1966), after which she won a contract with 20th Century Fox. They lent her contract to the British studio Hammer ...
and Mae West
Mae West (born Mary Jane West; August 17, 1893 – November 22, 1980) was an American stage and film actress, playwright, screenwriter, singer, and sex symbol whose entertainment career spanned over seven decades. She was known for her breezy ...
, who came out of a 27-year retirement to play Leticia Van Allen. Farrah Fawcett
Farrah Leni Fawcett (born Ferrah Leni Fawcett; February 2, 1947 – June 25, 2009) was an American actress. A four-time Primetime Emmy Award nominee and six-time Golden Globe Award nominee, Fawcett rose to international fame when she playe ...
said that they projected their dislike towards each other onto her and stopped talking to her and that she would cry in her dressing room, afraid to come out.
Furthermore, some 1940s- and 1950s-era film actors who appeared in ''Myra Breckinridge'' were upset that footage from their old films was inserted into the movie to punctuate some of the gags and the film's climactic rape sequence. After the film was previewed in San Francisco
San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...
, the White House
The White House is the official residence and workplace of the president of the United States. It is located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW in Washington, D.C., and has been the residence of every U.S. president since John Adams in 1800. ...
demanded that footage from the 1937 film ''Heidi
''Heidi'' (; ) is a work of children's fiction published in 1881 by Swiss author Johanna Spyri, originally published in two parts as ''Heidi: Her Years of Wandering and Learning'' (german: Heidis Lehr- und Wanderjahre) and ''Heidi: How She Used ...
'', featuring Shirley Temple
Shirley Temple Black (born Shirley Jane Temple;While Temple occasionally used "Jane" as a middle name, her birth certificate reads "Shirley Temple". Her birth certificate was altered to prolong her babyhood shortly after she signed with Fox in ...
, be removed due to Temple's role as a United States ambassador. Loretta Young
Loretta Young (born Gretchen Young; January 6, 1913 – August 12, 2000) was an American actress. Starting as a child, she had a long and varied career in film from 1917 to 1953. She won the Academy Award for Best Actress for her role in the fil ...
also successfully sued to have footage of herself removed from the film. Commenting on this, Rex Reed
Rex Taylor Reed (born October 2, 1938) is an American film critic, occasional actor, and television host. He writes the column "On the Town with Rex Reed" for ''The New York Observer''.
Early life
Reed was born on October 2, 1938, in Fort Wort ...
, who co-starred and was then a columnist, said "This was a film where the lawsuits really flew".
"I've never seen so many personality conflicts on one picture," said Richard Zanuck. "Fryer has quit three times. I don't think there's anyone on this movie who hasn't been fired or quit three times. Including me."
"I feel sorry for Bob," said Zanuck. "Raquel is always nervous during a film. Rex isn't exactly easy. And Sarne is rough. Much tougher than he looks."
"Fryer is a really nice man," said Sarne. "We just disagree on everything."
"He tells everybody on this picture we're diametrically opposed, which we are," said Fryer. "I want to do a comedy. He wants to do a fantasy. He's trying to superimpose 1964 Fellini—not Fellini, mind you, but 1964 Fellini—on a subject matter which is way out to begin with."
"I don't understand it," said Giler. "Bobby Kennedy and Jack Kennedy, they were assassinated. But no one touches Sarne. Sarne's script for ''Myra'' should be hermetically sealed."
Rating
''Myra Breckinridge'' was one of two films with an X rating
An X rating is a rating used in various countries to classify films that have content deemed suitable only for adults. It is used when the violent or sexual content of a film is considered to be potentially disturbing to general audiences.
Aust ...
to be released by 20th Century Fox
20th Century Studios, Inc. (previously known as 20th Century Fox) is an American film production company headquartered at the Fox Studio Lot in the Century City area of Los Angeles. As of 2019, it serves as a film production arm of Walt Dis ...
in 1970 (the other being ''Beyond the Valley of the Dolls
''Beyond the Valley of the Dolls'' is a 1970 American satirical musical melodrama film starring Dolly Read, Cynthia Myers, Marcia McBroom, Phyllis Davis, John LaZar, Michael Blodgett, and David Gurian. The film was directed by Russ Meyer and scr ...
'', which became a satirical camp classic).
Reception
Upon its release, the film drew fiercely negative reviews and was a box office flop. ''Time
Time is the continued sequence of existence and events that occurs in an apparently irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequence events, to ...
'' stated "''Myra Breckinridge'' is about as funny as a child molester
Child sexual abuse (CSA), also called child molestation, is a form of child abuse in which an adult or older adolescent uses a child for sexual stimulation. Forms of child sexual abuse include engaging in sexual activities with a child (whether ...
. It is an insult to intelligence, an affront to sensibility and an abomination to the eye." The critic added that the film was "so tasteless, it represents some sort of nadir in the history of American cinema". Gene Siskel
Eugene Kal Siskel (January 26, 1946 – February 20, 1999) was an American film critic and journalist for the ''Chicago Tribune''. Along with colleague Roger Ebert, he hosted a series of movie review programs on television from 1975 until his d ...
gave the film half of one star out of four, writing, "Screenwriters David Giler and Michael Sarne have mangled Gore Vidal's sexy and clever novel, ''Myra Breckinridge,'' in adapting it for the screen. Gratuitous nudity and oafish direction have replaced wit and mystery." Herb Kelly wrote in ''The Miami News
''The Miami News'' was an evening newspaper in Miami, Florida. It was the media market competitor to the morning edition of the ''Miami Herald'' for most of the 20th century. The paper started publishing in May 1896 as a weekly called ''The Miami ...
'': "I now nominate ''Myra Breckinridge'' as the worst movie ever made ... nothing can touch it for tastelessness and boredom". ''Variety
Variety may refer to:
Arts and entertainment Entertainment formats
* Variety (radio)
* Variety show, in theater and television
Films
* ''Variety'' (1925 film), a German silent film directed by Ewald Andre Dupont
* ''Variety'' (1935 film), ...
'' wrote that the film "plunges straight downhill under the weight of artless direction". The film is also cited in the book ''The Fifty Worst Films of All Time
''The'' () is a grammatical article in English, denoting persons or things already mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The'' is the m ...
''. Gore Vidal
Eugene Luther Gore Vidal (; born Eugene Louis Vidal, October 3, 1925 – July 31, 2012) was an American writer and public intellectual known for his epigrammatic wit, erudition, and patrician manner. Vidal was bisexual, and in his novels and ...
disowned the film, calling it "an awful joke". Film historian Leonard Maltin
Leonard Michael Maltin (born December 18, 1950) is an American film critic and film historian, as well as an author of several mainstream books on cinema, focusing on nostalgic, celebratory narratives. He is perhaps best known for his book of fil ...
gave the film a BOMB (his lowest possible score). In his movie guide, he states that the film "tastelessly exploits many old Hollywood favorites through film clips". He also calls the film "as bad as any movie ever made".
In a 2012 interview with Mark Peikert, Welch said of the film, "The only good thing about that was the clothes."
Home media
In 2004, ''Myra Breckinridge'' was released on DVD with minor changes: to make the film's ending (that the title character never had a sex change) clearer, the ending sequence was changed to a black-and-white
Black-and-white (B&W or B/W) images combine black and white in a continuous spectrum, producing a range of shades of grey.
Media
The history of various visual media began with black and white, and as technology improved, altered to color. ...
format. Since its release, it has developed a fan following.
See also
* List of American films of 1970
This is a list of American films released in 1970.
''Patton'' won the Academy Award for Best Picture.
The top-grossing film at the U.S. box office was ''Airport''.
__TOC__
A–B
C–F
G–I
J–M
N–S
T–Z
See also
* 1970 in ...
* List of films considered the worst
The films listed below have been cited by a variety of notable critics in varying media sources as being among the worst films ever made. Examples of such sources include Metacritic, Roger Ebert's list of most-hated films, ''The Golden Turkey ...
* New Hollywood
The New Hollywood, also known as American New Wave or Hollywood Renaissance, was a movement in American film history from the mid-1960s to the early 1980s, when a new generation of young filmmakers came to prominence.
They influenced the types o ...
References
External links
*
*
*
*
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Myra Breckenridge
1970 films
1970s sex comedy films
1970 LGBT-related films
American LGBT-related films
American sex comedy films
1970s English-language films
Collage film
Films directed by Michael Sarne
Films about actors
Films set in the 1960s
Films shot in Los Angeles
Lesbian-related films
Films about trans women
20th Century Fox films
Films based on works by Gore Vidal
Films about rape
1970 comedy films
1970s American films