CALL ME MADAM (2oth Century-Fox, 1953) Fox Home Video
In honor of the Walt Disney Corporation’s most recent public announcement that, after decades of sitting on their own goldmine of Uncle Walt’s live-action film legacy, as well as to have since annexed the asset management catalog of the now-defunct 2oth Century-Fox (inexplicably rechristened 2oth Century Studios by Disney Inc.), Walt’s successors have reached a distribution deal with Grover Crisp and Sony Home Entertainment (whose home video model is decidedly more progressive and aggressive), we at Nix Pix have decided to revisit several Fox catalog releases, decidedly, requiring some immediate love and attention. Ethel Merman gives the greatest one woman show in Irving Berlin’s Call Me Madam (1953), an exuberant musical/comedy, thinly veiled, but accurately based on the life of Perle Mesta - Washington D.C.’s self-proclaimed ‘ hostess with the mostest .’ A wealthy widow and socialite who became active in the Democratic Party, and, a staunch advocate for Harry S. Truman, Mesta was we
