JULIE ANDREWS IS A WOMAN PRETENDING TO BE A MAN PRETENDING TO BE A WOMAN

Tonight I introduce a special screening of Victor/Victoria at Outfest Wednesdays at the Egyptian Theater in Hollywood. I first saw Victor/Victoria when I was 12 years old and it completely blew me away. It remains one of my top two films (sharing honors with Tootsie - another gender-bending film from 1982.) A lifelong crush on Julie Andrews remains. Sure most of America loves her for her saccharine (though lovable) roles in Mary Poppins and The Sound of Music, but come on - Julie Andrews in male and female drag - simply divine.

Here are some of my favorite lines (too many really to list) from the film plus a You Tube clip of Julie Andrews singing Le Jazz Hot - my all time favorite musical moment.

Chorus Boy [#1]: [watching "Victor' rehearse] He's fantastic.
Chorus Boy [#2]: He's a phony.
Admirer at rehearsal: What do you mean?
Chorus Boy [#2]: If he's a Polish count, I'm Greta Garbo.
Admirer at rehearsal: [cooing] Well, Greta, whatever he is, I think he's divine.


Toddy: People believe what they see. This afternoon André Cassell will meet Europe's greatest female impersonator.

Victoria: André Cassell is the biggest agent in Paris. If I'm great, why hasn't he heard of me?

Toddy: You're the greatest, but you're unknown, except in Poland.

Victoria: Poland?

Toddy: You're Count Grazinski, Polish aristocrat. You speak very little English. Your family disowned you when they found out you're gay. We met in Warsaw, fell in love, I brought you to Paris.

Victoria: Hold it!

Toddy: What's wrong?

Victoria: "What's wrong?" What's right? A woman pretending to be a man pretending to be a woman? Ridiculous.

Toddy: It's preposterous. It's so preposterous, no one would believe it.

Victoria: You expect them to believe Count...

Toddy: Grazinski.

Victoria: Grazinski, a gay, Polish female impersonator.

Toddy: Darling, all anybody has to believe is that you're a man. To convince an audience that an illusion is real...the magician creates a plausible diversion. Count Grazinski is our plausible diversion.

Victoria: Toddy, no audience is that gullible. They'll know he's a phony. Right. Well?

Toddy: They'll know he's a phony.



Norma: I think that the right woman could reform you.
Toddy: You know, I think that the right woman could reform you, too.



Toddy: [singing] When people speak of Gay Paree / They think that when they say Paree is gay / They mean that Gay Paree is "Gay!" / It is not in the way Paree was gay in yesterday Paree / It means today that Gay Paree *is* Gay.
[the pianist plays the Fairy Waltz. Toddy stops him]
Toddy: [spoken] Not that gay.