Filmland Follies

                One day in the early '50s, Howard Hawks woke up and thought "What if I made Bringing Up Baby but with monkeys and an actual baby?" And just like that, Monkey Business was born.               Well, I don't know if that's how it really went. But in the realm of animal-driven screwball comedies, Monkey Business tends to be overshadowed. Maybe it wasn't as influential as, say, Bringing Up Baby , but it's sure a barrel of laughs (and monkeys). Just take a look at the cast:                I may be biased, but that's a pretty incredible cast. There's Cary Grant - arguably one of Old Hollywood's top screwball comedy stars (see above). There's Ginger Rogers - a top-notch comedic actress, with a knack for screwball as seen in films like Carefree . And there's Marilyn Monroe in an early film appearance! Don't be misled by the advertisements or IMDB reviews - Monkey Business is not really a Marilyn Monroe film. True, you can

                If you know me, you know I love movie costumes. I recently watched Royal Wedding for the first time, and boy, oh boy, did it have amazing costumes. The movie was originally planned as a Fred Astaire/Judy Garland vehicle to capitalize on their smash success in Easter Parade . Costume designer Helen Rose began making costumes for Judy, but when Judy had to drop out of the film, Rose transferred those designs over to up-and-coming star Jane Powell.               I had to do a fair bit of research to figure out who designed Royal Wedding 's costumes. There wasn't a designer credited in the film, and the Wikipedia page doesn't list one. Eventually, thanks to handy-dandy IMDB, I found one little bullet point hidden in the Cast and Crew section: "Helen Rose (uncredited)." Uncredited??!?! was my general reaction to that. Helen Rose was an icon of costume design! She did On The Town and Annie Get Your Gun and Million Dollar Mermaid and Cat on a Hot Ti