Bell, Book and Candle


Bell, Book and Candle is a 1958 American Technicolor comedy-drama romance film directed by Richard Quine, based on the successful 1950 Broadway play by John Van Druten adapted by Daniel Taradash. It stars Kim Novak as a witch who casts a spell on her neighbor, played by James Stewart. The supporting cast features Jack Lemmon, Ernie Kovacs, Hermione Gingold, and Elsa Lanchester. The film is considered Stewart's final role as a romantic lead.

Plot

In the late 1950s, during the Christmas holiday season, Greenwich Village witch Gillian Holroyd, a free spirit with a penchant for going barefoot, is bored, a little depressed and dissatisfied with her routine life. Gillian seems to be curious about her new neighbor, a publisher named Shep Henderson, who lives above her rare African art store and ground floor apartment. When Shep arrives home and unlocks his door, he discovers Gillian's aunt, Queenie, in his living room rummaging through his desk. Queenie lives in the building and is also curious about the recently moved-in neighbor and studies his belongings to know more about him. She explains her intrusion by telling Shep that she came in to shut a window he left open because it was snowing outside. Perplexed how she got inside and annoyed to find Queenie in his apartment, he becomes terse with her and tells her he needs to make personal phone calls, strongly hinting for her to leave. Annoyed with his rudeness, Queenie puts a hex on the telephone and leaves the apartment. When Shep lifts the handset to make a call, he hears garbled voices on the other end. It becomes clear that Queenie possesses magical powers. Consequently, Shep shows up at Gillian's store and asks her if he could use her phone to report the troubled line.
That night at The Zodiac Club, Gillian, Queenie, and Gillian's warlock bongo-playing brother Nicky meet Shep and his fiancé Merle Kittridge who both drop in. Gillian recognizes Merle as an old college enemy of hers and torments her with encircling trumpet players. She learns that Shep is planning to marry her the next day so later that night back at her apartment, when Shep drops in by himself on his way home, Gillian takes revenge by using her Siamese cat and familiar, Pyewacket, to cast a love spell on Shep, who becomes immediately enamoured with Gillian. She will use him more as a pseudo boyfriend and close companion, as witches, according to the film's plot, cannot fall in love.
Shep then is compelled the next morning, after staying up all night talking and canoodling Gillian out on the town, to visit Merle at her apartment to break up suddenly with her on the day of the marriage. She is left confused and astonished, with him saying that he doesn't love her anymore.
Sidney Redlitch, the author of the best-selling book Magic in Mexico, arrives in Shep's office after Gillian discovers Shep's interest in meeting him and publishing his next book. Redlitch is researching a book on witches in New York, and unknown to Gillian he acquires an "inside" collaborator in Gillian's brother Nicky when Nicky offers his inside knowledge on witches in exchange for a portion of the proceeds.
Gillian eventually realises that with Shep's total obsession for her and proposal of marriage, she must make a choice, as, in the film's plotline, witches who fall in love lose their supernatural powers. She discovers her brother is collaborating on the witches book and is furious, feeling that Shep will find out about her and her family through the book and will realise that his love was only the result of her spell.
Gillian uses her magic to make Shep lose all interest in publishing Nicky and Redlitch's book, making his reading of it a drudgery, him thinking the whole story is ridiculous and hopeless as a commercial proposition. Gillian comes to Shep's office and confesses her identity as a witch to Shep, feeling she needs to be honest with him. Still in love with her, he simply doesn't believe her story, but in a chance encounter on the street outside his apartment later with Queenie, she inadvertently confirms the version of events and Shep becomes angry, believing Gillian enchanted him just to spite Merle. Shep confronts Gillian and the two quarrel, with Shep leaving her heartbroken after he has confirmation that his infatuation was indeed a spell. Gillian threatens to cast various spells on Merle, such as making her fall in love with the first man who walks into her apartment plus give her uncontrollable compulsions to travel all over the world. Pyewacket however refuses to be involved in Gillian's attempts to cast a spell on Merle and runs away.
Meanwhile, Shep, through the recommendation of Nicky, turns to another witch, Bianca De Pass, who can break the original spell by making a horrid looking and smelling potion in her ramshackle house and making him drink it whilst he is verbally taunted by her giant parrot. He does so in the hopes he can get back to his previous existence. He then visits Merle to explain that Gillian is a witch and his behaviour has been the result of her spell. Merle does not believe him and is not interested in any further friendship with him. He thinks Gillian may have cast a curse on Merle and warns her, unaware that Pyewacket ran away and no curse was cast.
Months later, with Gillian moping and realising that she had indeed fallen in love with Shep for real, she is too proud to confront him. Pyewacket turns up at Shep's office, climbing through his open window to find him too in an irritable mood, also unhappy about his life in general. Capturing Pyewacket in his wastepaper basket, he returns him to Gillian's store and discovers she has lost her magic powers because she can now cry.
We learn that Pyewacket is now Queenie's cat and it's implied she must have sent Pyewacket to Shep's office to help resolve the love-struck pair's situation. When Shep realizes Gillian's love is true, he too realizes he loves her for real and the two reconcile.

Cast

Production

purchased the rights to Van Druten's play in 1953, planning to cast his wife, Jennifer Jones, in the part of Gil. At the urging of Daniel Taradash and Julian Blaustein, Columbia purchased the property from Selznick in 1956.
Taradash, who had adapted From Here to Eternity for Columbia with great success, augmented the story slightly by incorporating characters who are only names in the play and expanding the action to locations beyond Gil's apartment.
For the lead roles, Taradash and Blaustein hoped to get Rex Harrison and Lilli Palmer, who had starred in the play, but Columbia chief Harry Cohn decided on Kim Novak for the female lead. Novak was on loan to Paramount making Vertigo and the scheduling conflict put Harrison out of consideration as well. Taradash and Blaustein also suggested Cary Grant and Grace Kelly as the leads and Alexander Mackendrick to direct; Kelly got married, however, and there were creative differences between the studio and both Grant and Mackendrick. Since the arrangement with Paramount for Novak's appearance in Vertigo included reciprocity, Cohn advanced James Stewart for the role of Shep. Bell, Book and Candle is generally recognized as Stewart's final romantic leading role.
Early in 1957, producers also launched a somewhat promotional search for Siamese cats to play Pyewacket. According to one release, as many as 12 cats were needed to perform the number of stunts in the film.
Production began on February 3, 1958, and was completed on April 7.

Music

The movie was scored by George Duning, another Columbia veteran who earned praise for his work on From Here to Eternity. The main theme melds bongos and violins, evoking elements of the plot; heard during the opening credits, a few staves of "Jingle Bells" are incorporated to set the Christmas tone of the initial action. Each witch, including Pyewacket the cat, is identified by a musical signature. Duning used creative means such as recording sounds and replaying them at high speed to achieve an eerie background effect for the score.
The soundtrack was released in January 1959 by Colpix. Most of the recording took place in Munich with Duning conducting the Graunke Symphony Orchestra. The segments featuring the Brothers Candoli, who appear in the film playing at the Zodiac Club, were recorded in Hollywood at Columbia; on these tracks, John Williams can be heard on piano.
Philippe Clay makes a cameo appearance in the film performing "Le Noyé Assassiné" at the Zodiac Club, but this performance is not included on the soundtrack album. However, Harkit Records in England have reissued the soundtrack album as HRKCD 8099 which does include the Phillippe Clay track.

DVD release

The film was released on DVD on March 28, 2000. The DVD includes vintage advertising, talent files and the original theatrical trailer. It also includes audio and subtitle tracks for English and Spanish, bonus trailers, the open matte full-frame theatrical cut and a matted widescreen-only extended cut with four minutes of footage not seen in theaters. The theatrical cut of the film is included on the DVD along with the extended version, which is 106 minutes long.

Release and reception

Bell, Book and Candle was considered a "blockbuster" by Columbia and prior to its release it was promoted accordingly. Novak appeared with Pyewacket on the November 25 cover of Life, along with a write-up that highlighted a tie-in with Life photographer Eliot Elisofon who was the color consultant on the film. There were favorable write-ups in other major magazines and a production number on The Steve Allen Show featured the theme music.
On November 11, 1958, the movie made its world premiere in Los Angeles at the Warner Beverly Theatre. It played an exclusive engagement there until its New York premiere on December 25.

Awards

Bell, Book and Candle received Academy Award nominations in two categories: Best Art Direction ; and Best Costume Design. It also received a Golden Globes nomination for Best Motion Picture – Comedy.

Legacy and attempted adaptations

Bewitched creator Sol Saks admitted that he drew on Bell as well as the earlier witch-themed I Married a Witch. Screenwriter Paul Wayne said: "He was pretty honest about the fact it wasn't a particularly original idea."
In 1976, Bell, Book and Candle was pitched as a television sitcom fantasy series. A 30-minute pilot episode, starring Yvette Mimieux and Michael Murphy, aired on NBC on September 8, 1976. The supporting cast included: Doris Roberts, John Pleshette, Bridget Hanley, Susan Sullivan, Edward Andrews, and Dori Whitaker. The pilot was directed by Hy Averback and written by Richard DeRoy. Bruce Lansbury was the executive producer. The show was not picked up.
In 2006, The Walt Disney Company planned a remake of the film, with Alicia Keys scheduled to play Gillian Holroyd. The deal was organized by Disney studio executives Dick Cook and Nina Jacobson. Keys was going to produce it with her manager Jeff Robinson as the first project for their company Big Pita, Little Pita; Keys would have also been the musical supervisor and organized the soundtrack. Robinson had chosen Keys for the remake after watching the original film; she agreed to the project to avoid "from falling into predictable roles". She explained: “I never wanted to play myself, not in the first role or even the second. I want to do the unexpected.” Keys said that the remake would be more "contemporary" and "really delve into the characters more". According to Kurt Loder of Rotten Tomatoes, the remake was never made and Keys dropped out of the role.