Taglines: The frank, revealing story of Lillian Roth’s life! Best-seller now a film sensation.
I’ll Cry Tomorrow movie storyline. Deprived of a normal childhood by her ambitious mother, Katie, Lillian Roth becomes a star of Broadway and Hollywood before she is twenty. Shortly before her marriage to her childhood sweetheart, David Tredman, he dies and Lillian takes her first drink of many down the road of becoming an alcoholic.
She enters into a short-lived marriage to an immature aviation cadet, Wallie, followed by a divorce and then marriage to a sadistic brute and abuser Tony Bardeman. After a failed suicide attempt, Burt McGuire comes to her aid and helps her find the road back to happiness after sixteen years in a nightmare world, not counting the first twenty with her mother.
I’ll Cry Tomorrow (1955) is a biopic that tells the story of Lillian Roth, a Broadway star who rebels against the pressure of her domineering mother and struggles with alcoholism after the death of her fiancé. It stars Susan Hayward, Richard Conte, Eddie Albert, Margo, and Jo Van Fleet.
The screenplay was adapted by Helen Deutsch and Jay Richard Kennedy from the 1954 autobiography by Lillian Roth, Mike Connolly and Gerold Frank. It was directed by Daniel Mann. The film won the Academy Award for Best Costume Design for Helen Rose, and had three other Academy Award nominations, including Best Actress for Susan Hayward. It was entered into the 1956 Cannes Film Festival.
About the Story
Eight-year-old Lillian Roth (Carole Ann Campbell) constantly is pushed by her domineering stage mother Katie (Jo Van Fleet) to audition and act even though she is merely a child. One day, Katie secures an opportunity in Chicago, which leads to Lillian, now older (Susan Hayward), to having a successful musical career. Even though 20 years have passed, Katie still is managing Lillian as well as running her life and career choices.
Although her mother does not tell her, Lillian finds out that her childhood friend David (Ray Danton) tried to get in contact with her. She visits him in the hospital, and they soon fall in love. Because David is an entertainment company lawyer, he is able to secure Lillian shows at some big venues, including one at the Palace Theatre.
However, there is latent tension between David and Katie because he feels that Katie is projecting her own ambitions onto Lillian and overworking her, and Katie feels a new man in Lillian’s life only serves to distract from her high-profile career. When Lillian informs her mother she intends to marry David, Katie is disappointed and sees a repeat of her own life happening—giving up a career to have a husband and children. Suddenly, David falls ill and dies during the opening night of her show, and she is despondent at having lost the love of her life.
Rebelling against her mother’s domineering ways, Lillian turns to drinking. One night, in a drunken stupor, she goes out with a sailor, Wallie (Don Taylor), and marries him that night but does not remember it. They remain married, but the marriage is loveless from the beginning. The only thing the two have in common is drinking, and both drink to forget the present. Lillian’s career suffers as a result of her persistent alcoholism, and she spends all her money without booking new shows. The two divorce after Wallie says he is “sick of being Mr. Lillian Roth.”
Two years later, Lillian meets fellow alcoholic Tony Bardeman (Richard Conte) at a dinner party, and she falls for him. However, Lillian goes through alcohol withdrawal when she stops drinking to please her mother, and instead she turns to being a secret drinker. Her drinking gets worse when Tony goes home to California, but when he returns, Lillian begs him to stay with her. They decide to stop drinking together, but once they are married, Tony starts to drink, and Lillian is outraged. When she tries to stop him from drinking and leave, he beats her.
I’ll Cry Tomorrow (1955)
Directed by: Daniel Mann
Starring: Susan Hayward, Richard Conte, Eddie Albert, Margo, Jo Van Fleet, Virginia Gregg, Carole Ann Campbell, Peter Leeds, Veda Ann Borg, Chet Brandenburg, Peter Brocco
Screenplay by: Helen Deutsch, Jay Richard Kennedy
Production Design by:
Cinematography by: Arthur E. Arling
Film Editing by: Harold F. Kress
Costume Design by: Helen Rose
Set Decoration by: Hugh Hunt, Edwin B. Willis
Art Direction by: Malcolm Brown, Cedric Gibbons
Music by: Alex North
MPAA Rating: None.
Distributed by: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Release Date: December 25, 1955
Views: 238