Shirley Valentine **** (1989, Pauline Collins, Tom Conti, Alison Steadman, Julia McKenzie, Joanna Lumley, Sylvia Syms, Bernard Hill) – Classic Movie Review 6556

Producer-director Lewis Gilbert follows his 1983 hit Educating Rita with another hit version of a theatre play by Willy Russell, with another actress on Oscar nominated form and Russell again providing his own screenplay (as well as score).

This time Pauline Collins was Oscar nominated for the 1989 film version of Willy Russell’s stage show in which she plays Shirley Valentine, a homely suburban  middle-aged Liverpool housewife who rebels against her unthinking husband Joe (Bernard Hill) and takes off to the island of Mykonos, Greece, with her friend Jane (Alison Steadman).

The Greek island air of Agios Ioannis Beach and a summer vacation does her the power of good – amazing what a change of scenery does for you! – and soon the housewife is enjoying a sun-kissed extramarital affair and escapist holiday romance.

A wonderfully life-affirming Collins is the more or less whole show in this funny, touching, adorable romantic comedy. But Tom Conti enjoys himself hugely in a self-consciously amusing Zorba the Greek-style turn as Costas, the Greek café owner who romances her, while Julia McKenzie (as Shirley’s annoying friend Gillian), Joanna Lumley (as charming Marjorie), Sylvia Syms (as the headmistress) and George Costigan (as Dougie) provide attractive cameos.

It is shot in Technicolor by Alan Hune, scored by Willy Russell and George Hatzinassios and designed by John Stoll. It was filmed in Mykonos, Greece; London and Liverpool.

‘The Girl Who Used to Be Me’ took the film’s second Oscar nomination for Best Original Song for Marvin Hamlisch (music), Alan Bergman (lyrics) and Marilyn Bergman (lyrics). It had no luck at the Golden Globes either, but Collins won the Best Actress award at the BAFTA Film Awards and the Evening Standard British Film Awards, with Russell taking the Evening Standard Best Screenplay award.

Noreen Kershaw starred as Shirley Valentine when the play premiered in 1986 at the Liverpool Everyman Theatre. In the bravura one-woman show, the actress plays the title character and voices all the other characters during her one long continuous monologue.

Collins took over as Shirley in the original West End run of the play at the Vaudeville Theatre in London in 1988 (directed by Simon Callow). She won the Olivier award for the London production. Then Collins won the Tony award Best Actress in a Play when she performed the one-woman play on Broadway. It ran for 324 performances at the Booth Theater in New York from 16 February 1989 until 25 November 1989.

The TV version edits the liberatingly strong language, which include 14 F-words, tits, clitorises, shit, bloody, piss off, bugger, hell, Jesus!, screw, crap, hooker, whore, God!, friggin, shite and bitch. It has a 15 certificate.

Shirley voices her thoughts straight to camera, just as Michael Caine does in Lewis Gilbert’s Alfie (1966).

Lumley gets fifth billing for her single day’s work as the older Marjorie Majors.

© Derek Winnert 2018 Classic Movie Review 6556

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