"Well, nobody's perfect."

Some Like It Hot (1959) holds a special place in film for me. It was the first movie I had ever seen with Marilyn Monroe in it. Like everyone else, I had heard stories about her beauty and seen publicity images of her throughout my life. But when she appeared on the screen as Sugar Kovalchick – I was disappointed. By the end of the movie I had become delighted.

I learned through the course of Some Like It Hot that Marilyn Monroe was not the most beautiful woman to ever walk the face of the earth, like her image portrays her to be. She was an actual person. This realization led me to delve deeper into her life story and eventually led to me writing a book about her.

So Some Like It Hot is not only a great comedy that irritated censors when it was released, it is the perfect introduction for anyone who has not seen a Marilyn Monroe movie.

It was her must successful picture and the one she is most associated with. The American Film Institute ranked it the number one comedy of all-time during its 100 Years… series. It is constantly ranked in most critics top 50 movies of all-time.

Now you might not agree with the AFI about it being the best comedy of all-time, I certainly don’t, but it is good enough to be mentioned in the top 10.

This year happens to be the 50th Anniversary of the movie’s release. For more on the back story of the movie, I have written an article for Classic Images Magazine that should appear in the March issue or sometime around the original release date.

For now I will just discuss the story. Jack Lemmon and Tony Curtis play musicians in Prohibition Chicago. Their club is raided by the police, leaving the two in need of work. They go around to the musical agencies, but all they are able to find is a gig in Champagne, IL. Curtis and Lemmon are without a car and have to borrow one.

Unfortunately for them, when they get to the garage to pick-up the car they are witnesses to the St. Valentine’s Day massacre. The Al Capone character is Spats Colombo, played by veteran of the gangster picture, George Raft. Of course gangster hate it when there are witnesses, so Spats and his gang search for Lemmon and Curtis.

The only escape it seems for these two musicians is to join a band destined for Florida. The only problem is the band happens to be an all-girl one. So, the two dress in drag and get new names. Lemmon becomes Daphne and Curtis is Josephine.

On the train down to Florida, which happens to look a lot like Coronado Beach, the “girls” meet Sugar Kovalchick, a ukulele player and singer for the band. It doesn’t take long before Daphne has to be reminded by Josephine that he is a girl. While Josephine keeps Daphne away from Sugar, he moves in on her.

This does not sit well with Daphne who ends up carrying their bags into the Hotel Del Coronado, or whatever the hotel is supposed to be called in the movie. Daphne gets some help with the bags from Joe E. Brown’s Osgood Fielding III. Osgood has it bad for Daphne. So instead of a love triangle we have two couples. Daphne and Osgood and Sugar and Josephine, or at least Tony Curtis.

In another change of characters, Curtis impersonates a millionaire who talks a lot like Cary Grant. He tries to seduce the materialistic Sugar Kane.

Things seem to be going well for the two men. Each is happy with his mate. Things become a bit complicated though when Spats and his gang make an appearance at the Florida Hotel as part of an Italian Opera convention. Writers Billy Wilder and I.A.L. Diamond are not going long-hair artsy with this stuff. But it doesn’t matter as audiences love it.

From here, Lemmon and Curtis run away from Spats and his gang. Their only escape is Osgood’s boat. Before leaving though, Curtis explains to Marilyn that he is a man and she still loves him. Lemmon does the same thing and gets the same reaction from Osgood in one of the best closing lines in all of cinema.