A Flea in her Ear ** (1968, Rex Harrison, Rachel Roberts, Rosemary Harris, Louis Jourdan) – Classic Movie Review 11,522

Director Jacques Charon’s 1968 DeLuxe Color 20th Century Fox American/ French feature Panavision film comedy A Flea in her Ear stars Rex Harrison, Rachel Roberts, Rosemary Harris and Louis Jourdan.

Harrison plays the always-exhausted lawyer Victor Chandebisse, who is accused of philandering by his wife Gabrielle (Harris), so she tries to catch him out by arranging to have an assignation with him at a lovers’ bordello hotel, the Hotel Coq d’Or, so he is unaware the woman he is going to meet is his wife.

Maybe this brilliant stage farce needed to stay in the theatre. Georges Feydeau’s typical, frothy farce La Puce à l’Oreille [Hotel Coq d’Or] needs faster, more vigorous handling on screen than it gets here. A lot of the jokes are badly timed and fall flat, and the performances are not perfect, which is surprising as Rex was a master of comic timing.

But there is still a lot to enjoy as the cast try hard and there is a beautiful production with the best attention possible paid to the sets (Alexander Trauner), costumes, photography (Charles Lang) and music (Bronislau Kaper). Harrison also plays the night porter, Jourdan plays his buddy, and Edward Hardwicke (in the film’s best performance) plays Pierre Chandebisse, a young stud with speech problems. There are also polished turns from John Williams as Dr Finache and Frank Thornton as Charles the butler.

It is an adaptation by John Mortimer of his stage version of the 1907 play A Flea in Her Ear [La Puce à l’Oreille] by Georges Feydeau. Charon had directed the farce successfully at the National Theatre in London.

Also in the cast are John Williams, Grégoire Aslan, Edward Hardwicke, Frank Thornton, Isla Blair, Georges Descrières, Victor Sen Yung, Laurence Badie, Moustache, Dominique Davray, and Olivier Hussenot.

The budget was $4,950,000 but in September 1970 20th Century Fox announced it had lost $3,736,000 on the film.

The cast are Rex Harrison as Victor Chandebisse/ Poche, Rosemary Harris as Gabrielle Chandebisse, Louis Jourdan as Henri Tournel, Rachel Roberts as Suzanne de Castillian, John Williams as Dr Finache, Edward Hardwicke as Pierre Chandebisse, Georges Descrières as Don Carlos d Castilian, Isla Blair as Antoinette, Charles’s Wife, Frank Thornton as Charles the butler, Victor Sen Yung as Oke Saki, Laurence Badie as Eugenie, Hotel Coq d’Or Maid, Grégoire Aslan as Max, Hotel Coq d’Or Owner, Olivier Hussenot as Max’s Uncle Louis, Moustache, and Dominique Davray.

Derek Winnert 2021 Classic Movie Review 11,522

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