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IMDbPro

Baby Doll

  • 19561956
  • ApprovedApproved
  • 1h 54m
IMDb RATING
7.3/10
7.6K
YOUR RATING
Carroll Baker in Baby Doll (1956)
Theatrical Trailer from Warner Bros. Pictures
Play trailer3:00
1 Video
46 Photos
  • Comedy
  • Drama
An immature child bride holds her anxious husband at bay while flirting with an amorous Sicilian farmer.An immature child bride holds her anxious husband at bay while flirting with an amorous Sicilian farmer.An immature child bride holds her anxious husband at bay while flirting with an amorous Sicilian farmer.
IMDb RATING
7.3/10
7.6K
YOUR RATING
  • Director
    • Elia Kazan
  • Writer
    • Tennessee Williams(screenplay)
  • Stars
    • Karl Malden
    • Carroll Baker
    • Eli Wallach
Top credits
  • Director
    • Elia Kazan
  • Writer
    • Tennessee Williams(screenplay)
  • Stars
    • Karl Malden
    • Carroll Baker
    • Eli Wallach
  • See production, box office & company info
    • 79User reviews
    • 43Critic reviews
    • 83Metascore
  • See more at IMDbPro
    • Nominated for 4 Oscars
      • 3 wins & 13 nominations total

    Videos1

    Baby Doll
    Trailer 3:00
    Baby Doll

    Photos46

    Carroll Baker and Eli Wallach in Baby Doll (1956)
    Karl Malden, Carroll Baker, and Eli Wallach in Baby Doll (1956)
    Carroll Baker in Baby Doll (1956)
    Carroll Baker in Baby Doll (1956)
    Carroll Baker in Baby Doll (1956)
    Carroll Baker in Baby Doll (1956)
    Carroll Baker in Baby Doll (1956)
    Carroll Baker in Baby Doll (1956)
    Carroll Baker in Baby Doll (1956)
    Carroll Baker in Baby Doll (1956)
    Carroll Baker in Baby Doll (1956)
    Carroll Baker and Eli Wallach in Baby Doll (1956)

    Top cast

    Edit
    Karl Malden
    Karl Malden
    • Archie Lee Meighanas Archie Lee Meighan
    Carroll Baker
    Carroll Baker
    • Baby Doll Meighanas Baby Doll Meighan
    Eli Wallach
    Eli Wallach
    • Silva Vacarroas Silva Vacarro
    Mildred Dunnock
    Mildred Dunnock
    • Aunt Rose Comfortas Aunt Rose Comfort
    Lonny Chapman
    Lonny Chapman
    • Rockas Rock
    Eades Hogue
    • Town Marshalas Town Marshal
    Noah Williamson
    • Deputyas Deputy
    R.G. Armstrong
    R.G. Armstrong
    • Townsman Sidas Townsman Sid
    • (voice)
    • (uncredited)
    Madeleine Sherwood
    Madeleine Sherwood
    • Nurse in Doctor's Officeas Nurse in Doctor's Office
    • (uncredited)
    Rip Torn
    Rip Torn
    • The Dentistas The Dentist
    • (uncredited)
    • Director
      • Elia Kazan
    • Writer
      • Tennessee Williams(screenplay) (based upon his one act play, "Twenty Seven Wagons Full of Cotton")
    • All cast & crew
    • See more cast details at IMDbPro

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    Storyline

    Edit

    Did you know

    Edit
    • Trivia
      Feature film debut of Eli Wallach.
    • Goofs
      After Silva bursts through the door in the attic, Baby Doll is shown running from him with her blanket wrapped around her. The instant before she falls on to the attic beam, she removes the blanket, and holds it in her left hand. In the very next shot, after she has fallen, the blanket is wrapped around her body once again.
    • Quotes

      Baby Doll: Sometimes, big shot, you don't seem to give me credit for very much intelligence at all. I've been to school in my life - and I'm a magazine reader!

    • Connections
      Featured in Elia Kazan: An Outsider (1982)
    • Soundtracks
      Shame, Shame, Shame
      (uncredited)

      Written by Kenyon Hopkins and Ruby Fisher

      Sung by Smiley Lewis

    User reviews79

    Review
    Top review
    9/10
    Buy Arkansas
    This is a hilarious farce by Tennessee Williams, containing much self-parody. On one level, it can even be interpreted as a burlesque of his "A Streetcar Named Desire." "Stella!" becomes "Baby Doll!" If one cannot imagine the great dramatic playwright writing comedy, then this is the film to see.

    Even the story is a mockery. A foolish old man, Archie Lee Meighan (Karl Malden), pretending to be a Southern gentleman, with a rundown plantation and a cotton gin, tricks another old man into letting him marry his comely teenage daughter, Baby Doll (Caroll Baker). He promises to renovate the old farm for Baby Doll and to buy her the world. She agrees if he swears not to touch her until her twentieth birthday. The foolish old man quickly becomes a laughing stock to both blacks and whites who live in the small community in the delta region (there's a sham sign posted in the general store that reads, "Buy Arkansas"). To insure his hold on the rather worldly, not so innocent Baby Doll, Archie Lee burns down his competitor's cotton gin. His competitor, a Sicilian named Silva Vacarro (Eli Wallach), becomes Baby Doll's Latin lover to get back at Archie Lee.

    There are several memorable scenes in Elia Kazan's direction of Tennessee William's screenplay. The one that is most remembered because it created such a moral outrage at the time (even Baby Doll pajamas were marketed) shows Baby Doll lying in a baby crib, scantly clad in, what else?, baby doll pajamas, sucking her thumb and arousing all sorts of erotic sensations in the male observer. Another scene is one of the most laughable ever put on the big screen. Picture if you will Eli Wallach riding a hobby horse like a wild stallion while slurping lemonade from a pitcher, listening to "Shame, Shame, Shame" by Smiley Lewis on the record player. This is part of the mad Sicilian's seduction of Baby Doll in the most childish way conceivable, ultimately falling asleep in her baby crib with Baby Doll intoning to him a lullaby.

    In classical dramas, tragedies naturally had tragic endings and comedies had happy endings. Tennesee Williams' travesty doesn't exactly have a happy ending, but it's not a tragic ending either, more of a postponement of things to come.

    A personal note: I was twelve when "Baby Doll" opened in my home town in Arkansas. The churches and other so-called decency groups attempted to have it banned. There were even pickets outside the theater. Because of all the hype with pictures of Baby Doll flooding the media, I had to finagle a way to see it. Those under thirteen had to be accompanied by an adult (this was before the MPAA ratings system was developed--the PCA was beginning to bend its strict rules as American mores were changing. I mislead my dad, who paid little attention to movie previews, into thinking it was suitable for the general public. My dad attended the film with me and seemed to enjoy it as much as I did. He never told my mother about either one of us watching it.
    helpful•42
    7
    • krorie
    • Jul 17, 2006

    Details

    Edit
    • Release date
      • December 29, 1956 (United States)
    • Country of origin
      • United States
    • Official sites
      • HBOMAX (United States)
      • Official site
    • Languages
      • English
      • Italian
    • Also known as
      • Mississippi Woman
    • Filming locations
      • Benoit, Mississippi, USA
    • Production company
      • Newtown Productions
    • See more company credits at IMDbPro

    Box office

    Edit
    • Gross US & Canada
      • $2,300,000
    See detailed box office info on IMDbPro

    Technical specs

    Edit
    • Runtime
      1 hour 54 minutes
    • Color
      • Black and White
    • Sound mix
      • Stereo
    • Aspect ratio
      • 1.85 : 1

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