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Sunset Boulevard is a sung-through musical with music by Andrew Lloyd Webber, and lyrics and libretto by Don Black and Christopher Hampton. It is based on the 1950 film of the same title. The plot revolves around Norma Desmond, a faded star of the silent screen era, living in the past in her decaying mansion on the fabled Los Angeles street.
- Christopher Hampton, Don Black
- 1993
Sunset Boulevard is a 1950 American black comedy [1][2] film noir [3] directed by Billy Wilder and co-written by Wilder and Charles Brackett. It is named after a major street that runs through Hollywood.
- Overview
- Production notes and credits
- Cast
- Academy Award nominations (* denotes win)
Sunset Boulevard, American film noir, released in 1950, that is often cited as one of Hollywood’s greatest films, especially noted for Gloria Swanson’s portrayal of a fading silent-film star. The movie is named after the iconic street that runs through Los Angeles and Beverly Hills, Calif. Deemed “culturally, historically or aesthetically significant” to America’s film heritage, it was among the first films selected in 1989 for inclusion in the Library of Congress’s National Film Registry.
(Read Lillian Gish’s 1929 Britannica essay on silent film.)
Britannica Quiz
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A sharp critique of the film industry, Sunset Boulevard centres on the delusional aging film queen Norma Desmond (played by Swanson), who lives in a ramshackle mansion with her butler and former husband (Erich von Stroheim) while planning a doomed comeback. When Desmond takes on frustrated young screenwriter Joe Gillis (William Holden) as her lover, his attraction to a younger woman and his disgust with his own inability to leave the pampered life Desmond offers him culminates in murder.
(Read Martin Scorsese’s Britannica essay on film preservation.)
•Studio: Paramount Pictures
•Director: Billy Wilder
•Writers: Charles Brackett, Billy Wilder, and D.M. Marshman, Jr.
•Music: Franz Waxman
•Gloria Swanson (Norma Desmond)
•William Holden (Joe Gillis)
•Erich von Stroheim (Max Von Mayerling)
•Nancy Olson (Betty Schaefer)
•Picture
•Director
•Lead actor (William Holden)
•Lead actress (Gloria Swanson)
•Supporting actor (Erich von Stroheim)
•Supporting actress (Nancy Olson)
- Lee Pfeiffer
Sunset Boulevard: Directed by Billy Wilder. With William Holden, Gloria Swanson, Erich von Stroheim, Nancy Olson. A screenwriter develops a dangerous relationship with a faded film star determined to make a triumphant return.
- (239K)
- Drama, Film-Noir
- Billy Wilder
- 1950-08-04
Mar 9, 2024 · Sunset Boulevard is a 1950 film noir written and directed by Billy Wilder. It follows Joe Gillis, a struggling screenwriter, as he stumbles upon former movie star Norma Desmond. The latter persuades Joe to help her make a comeback by all means necessary.
Mar 11, 2003 · Written by Adrian Hennigan. Billy Wilder's 1950 drama "Sunset Boulevard" wasn't the first movie to hold a mirror up to Hollywood. But it was the first to show it warts'n'all. Take a trip down...
Feb 15, 2024 · Lloyd Webber is always brilliant at this as he instinctively writes theatrically and in Sunset Boulevard he was given licence to write those huge melodies that sweep the action along and recall the glory days of the Hollywood score.
