Tagline: Movie-wise, there has never been anything like it – laugh-wise, love-wise, or otherwise-wise!
The Apartment movie storyline. In a bid to get ahead, an ambitious, lowly, misguided and young insurance clerk C. C. Baxter (Jack Lemmon) generously lends out the keys to his NYC apartment to his company’s higher-up, philandering executives for romantic, adulterous, extra-marital trysts, including to his callous married boss J. D. Sheldrake (MacMurray). Baxter’s own budding crush toward his building’s elevator operator – melancholy. Vulnerable Fran Kubelik (Shirley MacLaine) turns ugly when he discovers he has been outsmarted – she is the latest conquest of his boss – and has attempted suicide in his apartment.
Baxter’s next-door, philosophizing doctor / neighbor Dr. Dreyfuss (Kruschen) convinces Baxter to confront the craven ethics of his superiors – and he wins the affections of Fran. Academy Award Nominations: 10, including Best Actor–Jack Lemmon, Best Actress–Shirley MacLaine, Best Supporting Actor–Jack Kruschen, Best B/W Cinematography, Best Sound. Academy Awards: Best Picture, Best Director, Best Story and Screenplay, Best B/W Art Direction/Set Decoration, Best Film Editing.
The Apartment is a 1960 romantic comedy-drama film produced and directed by Billy Wilder from a screenplay he co-wrote with I.A.L. Diamond, starring Jack Lemmon and Shirley MacLaine. The supporting cast includes Fred MacMurray, Ray Walston, Jack Kruschen, David Lewis, Willard Waterman, David White, Hope Holiday and Edie Adams. The film follows C. C. “Bud” Baxter (Lemmon), an insurance company clerk who permits his bosses to use his Upper West Side apartment to conduct extramarital affairs in hope of gaining a promotion. Simultaneously Bud pursues a relationship with elevator operator Fran Kubelik (MacLaine) – unaware she is having an affair with one of the apartment’s users (MacMurray).
The Apartment was distributed by United Artists to favourable reviews and commercial success, despite controversy owing to its subject matter. At the 33rd Academy Awards, The Apartment was nominated for ten awards and won five, including Best Picture, Best Director and Best Screenplay. Lemmon and MacLaine were Oscar-nominated and won Golden Globe Awards for their performances in the film. It provided the basis for Promises, Promises, a 1968 Broadway musical by Burt Bacharach, Hal David and Neil Simon.
The Apartment (1960)
Directed by: Billy Wilder
Starring: Jack Lemmon, Shirley MacLaine, Fred MacMurray, Ray Walston, Jack Kruschen, David Lewis, Hope Holiday, Joan Shawlee, Naomi Stevens, Johnny Seven, Joyce Jameson, David White
Screenplay by: Billy Wilder, I.A.L. Diamond
Cinematography by: Joseph LaShelle
Film Editing by: Daniel Mandell
Set Decoration by: Edward G. Boyle
Art Direction by: Alexandre Trauner
Music by: Adolph Deutsch
Distributed by: United Artists
Release Date: June 15, 1960
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