They are catty, narcissistic and self-serving. Of course, this is not something that would come as a surprise to most people, but “All about Eve” not only builds an entire movie around this concept, but insults our intelligence by relying completely on the assumption that we don’t already know this. With its deliberate “fly on the wall” approach which makes sure much of the interaction takes place in dressing rooms and backstage areas, this film seems to fancy itself as some kind of expose piece of investigative reporting. Now, before we get started there is a real chance I hate this movie so much because I feel like it walked away with a lot of the Oscars that “Sunset Boulevard” deserved, but to be fair I didn’t even know they competed against each other til after I watched “All about Eve.” Just putting all my cards on the table now.
There is a right way and a wrong way to do narration; generally I think it is a cop-out altogether but if it is necessary to keep the movie under 3 hours, it should at least be done creatively. “Double Indemnity” gets this right with the tape-recorded confession; I’m loathe to admit it but even “Dances with Wolves” may do it right with the journal entries. With “All about Eve” however, the film just starts off with plain lecture hall narrative that tells us everything in black and white so that there is no room for misinterpretation, or for that matter, on-screen character progression. The narration is done by the character Addison DeWitt, (George Sanders) who is a theater critic who immediately establishes that he has no endearing qualities by talking down to the viewer, implying that everyone who doesn’t know theater is essentially an uncultured buffoon. Even more frustrating is the fact that now we know the person speaking is a writer and he STILL can’t be bothered to be narrating in an interesting context.
DeWitt goes on to explain that we are watching an awards ceremony honoring Eve Harrington (Anne Baxter), the youngest recipient of the award in question. All the main characters are introduced in this drawn-out but somehow still glossed-over manner; Lloyd and Karen Richards (Hugh Marlowe and Celeste Holm) a playwright and his wife, producer Max Fabian (Gregory Ratoff) and a veteran stage actress Margo Channing (Bette Davis). The first inkling we get that there is some conflict in this film between Eve and the other characters is the fact that none of these characters look particularly enthused, or even interested, in the praise-laden speech the award presenter is heaping on Eve.
Once the dreadfully condescending and monotone narration is over and Eve is presented with the award, it seems like the present-time plot may commence. Unfortunately that’s not how this movie works. Instead, like the world’s most boring relay race, the narration duties are simply handed off to Karen. At least this time it advances the story. Karen flashes back several months to her first meeting with Eve; who is essentially a theater groupie who obsessively attends a play Margo is starring in night in and night out. Out of the goodness of her heart Karen brings Eve into the theater to meet Margo, who is her best friend. The scene that sets up the meeting between Eve and her idol Margo firmly establishes the majority of the characters who are “insiders” by the overwhelming approval they show when Margo launches into a tirade about how creepy and pathetic her fans are.
Margo and Lloyd feign compassion by listening to Eve’s backstory, where she explains that she is the poor only child of a farmer, former secretary and war-widow who has since devoted her time to following Margo across the country. Despite the general hateability of all the main characters, their backstage banter is amusing and probably among the best acted in the film. One of the most richly developed characters is also introduced at this point. Bill Sampson (Gary Merrill), Margo’s boyfriend who is also a director who is working in Hollywood as well as legitimate theater, but appears to be disillusioned by both. He and Eve have an incredible exchange where she very passively charms Bill the same way she does Margo, by pumping his ego.
Eve’s flattery earns her a place in Margo’s inner-circle where the only one who seems to distrust Eve and see past her naivety is Margo’s sarcastic, jaded maidservant Birdie (Thelma Ritter). Almost immediately I noticed the similarity between Birdie and Stella, the wisecracking home-health-care nurse in “Rear Window” who, as it turns out was also played by Ritter several years later. Much like Stella, Birdie provides a great deal of comedic cynicism and helps establish the “wisdom from an unlikely source” cliché that we still see today in characters like Idella in “Driving Miss Daisy” or Oscar in “Baby Mama.”
Somewhere between when Bill is introduced and Margo allows Eve to move in with her, Margo assumes the role of narrator; complicating things even further. I don’t think I would have minded this directorial tool nearly as much if it were done in a manner where everyone’s narratives are slightly different until there is one climactic point in the film where they all converge and fall into sync; but alas I think the only reason for the constantly switching narration is that even the director Joseph Mankiewicz realized there was just too much voice-over in this movie so changing the voice every now and then might help alleviate the boredom; it doesn’t.
Eve’s devotion begins to border on creepy, first when Margo catches her trying on one of her stage costumes and later when she arranges a midnight call to Hollywood so Margo can wish Bill a happy birthday right on time, even though Margo doesn’t even know it IS his birthday. Some insightful foreshadowing comes from Birdie who explains to Margo that Eve is not only strangely devoted to Margo, but almost acts as though she is trying to actually BE Margo. Once Margo makes this realization, she has such a hard time convincing everyone around her that it actually causes tension with them. Eve has essentially duped Margo’s entire inner-circle into trusting her, so much so that they all interpret Margo’s suspicion as envy of Eve’s youth and beauty.
“Bill's thirty-two. He looks thirty-two. He looked it five years ago, he'll look it twenty years from now. I hate men.” (Margo Channing, “All about Eve”)
At this point there is supposed to be a dynamic role-reversal, with Margo and Eve trading off the positions of Pro/Antagonist; as it is now evident that Eve has begun to methodically sabotage Margo’s personal life by turning her friends on her, as well as her professional life when she manages to earn a spot as Margo’s understudy. Even though we see Eve’s conniving side, Margo has simply not done enough to make us like her for this transition to occur. Her shabby treatment of Birdie, her vain obsession with age and looks and her borderline insane distrust of Bill all just make me hate her even more than before and realize that her career deserves to be destroyed.
Of course I don’t need to tell you how it all plays out. Eve gets what she wants, causes Margo to miss a performance, fills in, steals the show and wins the adoration of the theater-going public while alienating herself from Margo and everyone in her entourage. Furthermore, DeWitt manages to deconstruct Eve’s entire backstory- she is not a widow, she made up the story about following Margo across the country and she was sleeping with her boss at her last job until he paid her to leave town. In the pre-google days it would have been interesting to explain how he learned all these things about her, however I have to believe that it was just assumed that by this point everyone watching would just be asleep anyway. The film ends with a young wannabe actress sneaking into Eve’s apartment, claiming to adore her and imposing herself into Eve’s life- implying that everything has and will again come full circle, and that Eve is just the next Margo. So even if somehow that bitch Margo has managed to win you over, you can take comfort in knowing Eve will have a similar comeuppance.
There is some sharp dialogue in this film, as well as a few purposely unexplained plot devices that leave many things open for interpretation (Birdie having once been an actress herself, DeWitt seemingly using his influence to nail cheap bimbo actresses etc). Unfortunately, the quest for realism is hindered by the fact that the conversations are too realistic- that is to say they are written like normal banter… with nothing taken out for flow purposes. And this film is entirely dialogue driven- hardly any of the scenes take place outdoors or places where there would be secondary characters or even extras. Just the same people over and over again; and with the exception of Bill and Karen they are all pretty unlikeable.
Thankfully for this film’s legacy, it was set in the Broadway theater community rather than in Hollywood for two huge reasons: 1) it justifies the dramatic overacting by all the primaries but especially Bette Davis and 2) it didn’t anger the Hollywood community the way the far, FAR superior “Sunset Boulevard” did, as a result, it was a much easier pill to swallow as an Oscar movie in 1950 as being a “behind the scenes, unglamorous underbelly expose” picture. If you want to watch a movie that explores the ‘what goes on behind the façade” motif- practically ANY movie would be more entertaining; “A Star is Born,” “Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?” shit even the dreadful “Hollywoodland” was better than this injustice.
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