Who's A Fool? You're A Fool...

Tulips and daffodils and lupine - oh my!

April Fool's Day was my maternal grandmother's birthday - Meme, I wish you were still here to celebrate it - but my mom will be 91 on April 6th! Today is one of those days that, if you're into it, can be lots of fun (or totally annoying) and if you're not, it just passes, like any other day - but at least it's spring and beautiful flowers are everywhere!

The above title ("Who's a fool? You're a fool!") comes from the film "Bell, Book and Candle" - one of my all-time favorite movies - with a great cast (Kim Novak, Jimmy Stewart, Jack Lemmon, Ernie Kovaks, Elsa Lanchester, Hermione Gingold, Janice Rule and a gaggle of other great supporting players) and I chose it simply because it came into my head on this April Fool's Day, which is secondary to how much I love this movie...

Jimmy Stewart finds out he has been bewitched by Kim Novak and needs the help of a powerful witch who can break the spell, so Jack Lemmon and Ernie Kovaks take him to see Mrs. de Pass, played by Hermione Gingold. When Stewart enters the house, he is greeted by Mrs. de Pass' overly talkative parrot (a macaw, actually) who, when Stewart seems to be having second thoughts, yells out "Who's a fool? You're a fool!" and is answered by Gingold with (my favorite line in the movie) "Be quiet, Sybil!"

Kim Novak was (and is) one of the most beautiful and sensuous movie stars in Hollywood. She was known as "the Lavender Blonde" because the studio tinted her hair in a special way so she would stand out among all the other movie blondes. Va-va-va-voom!

Kim Novak plays sleek New York witch Gillian Holroyde, who casts spells with her cat, Pyewacket

Thanks to these two blogs for the photos and information:


http://grandoldmovies.wordpress.com


http://thepassionatemoviegoer.blogspot.com


(Movie critic Joe Baltake is The Passionate Moviegoer)

Now I want to watch the movie again! 

Visit the web sites if you want to learn more about Bell, Book and Candle (the 1958 film. directed by Richard Quine, is based on a 1950 play by John van Druten, most recently staged at New Haven's Long Wharf Theatre but now moving to Hartford Stage.)