Release CalendarDVD & Blu-ray ReleasesTop 250 MoviesMost Popular MoviesBrowse Movies by GenreTop Box OfficeShowtimes & TicketsIn TheatersComing SoonMovie NewsIndia Movie Spotlight
    What's on TV & StreamingTop 250 TV ShowsMost Popular TV ShowsBrowse TV Shows by GenreTV NewsIndia TV Spotlight
    What to WatchLatest TrailersIMDb OriginalsIMDb PicksIMDb Podcasts
    OscarsBest Picture WinnersBest Picture WinnersEmmysLGBTQ+ Pride MonthSTARmeter AwardsSan Diego Comic-ConNew York Comic-ConSundance Film FestivalToronto Int'l Film FestivalAwards CentralFestival CentralAll Events
    Born TodayMost Popular CelebsMost Popular CelebsCelebrity News
    Help CenterContributor ZonePolls
For Industry Professionals
  • All
  • Titles
  • TV Episodes
  • Celebs
  • Companies
  • Keywords
  • Advanced Search
Watchlist
Sign In
  • Fully supported
  • English (United States)
    Partially supported
  • Français (Canada)
  • Français (France)
  • Deutsch (Deutschland)
  • हिंदी (भारत)
  • Italiano (Italia)
  • Português (Brasil)
  • Español (España)
  • Español (México)
  • Cast & crew
  • User reviews
  • Trivia
IMDbPro

Sweet Charity

  • 19691969
  • GG
  • 2h 29m
IMDb RATING
6.9/10
5.9K
YOUR RATING
Shirley MacLaine and John McMartin in Sweet Charity (1969)
Trailer 1
Play trailer1:35
1 Video
99+ Photos
  • Comedy
  • Drama
  • Music
Taxi dancer Charity continues to have Faith despite endless disappointments at its hands, and Hope that she will finally meet the man to romance her away from her sleazy life. Maybe, just ma... Read allTaxi dancer Charity continues to have Faith despite endless disappointments at its hands, and Hope that she will finally meet the man to romance her away from her sleazy life. Maybe, just maybe, handsome Oscar will be the one to do it.Taxi dancer Charity continues to have Faith despite endless disappointments at its hands, and Hope that she will finally meet the man to romance her away from her sleazy life. Maybe, just maybe, handsome Oscar will be the one to do it.
IMDb RATING
6.9/10
5.9K
YOUR RATING
  • Director
    • Bob Fosse
  • Writers
    • Neil Simon(from the New York stage production book by)
    • Federico Fellini(based upon the screenplay by: "Nights of Cabiria")
    • Tullio Pinelli(based upon the screenplay by: "Nights of Cabiria")
  • Stars
    • Shirley MacLaine
    • John McMartin
    • Ricardo Montalban
Top credits
  • Director
    • Bob Fosse
  • Writers
    • Neil Simon(from the New York stage production book by)
    • Federico Fellini(based upon the screenplay by: "Nights of Cabiria")
    • Tullio Pinelli(based upon the screenplay by: "Nights of Cabiria")
  • Stars
    • Shirley MacLaine
    • John McMartin
    • Ricardo Montalban
  • See production, box office & company info
    • 86User reviews
    • 29Critic reviews
    • 53Metascore
  • See more at IMDbPro
    • Nominated for 3 Oscars
      • 6 nominations total

    Videos1

    Sweet Charity
    Trailer 1:35
    Sweet Charity

    Photos104

    Sweet Charity (1969)
    Sweet Charity (1969)
    Shirley MacLaine in Sweet Charity (1969)
    Shirley MacLaine in Sweet Charity (1969)
    Shirley MacLaine, Sammy Davis Jr., Paula Kelly, and Chita Rivera in Sweet Charity (1969)
    Shirley MacLaine in Sweet Charity (1969)
    Shirley MacLaine in Sweet Charity (1969)
    Shirley MacLaine and John McMartin in Sweet Charity (1969)
    Shirley MacLaine, Paula Kelly, and Chita Rivera in Sweet Charity (1969)
    Shirley MacLaine and John McMartin in Sweet Charity (1969)
    Shirley MacLaine, Paula Kelly, and Chita Rivera in Sweet Charity (1969)
    Shirley MacLaine in Sweet Charity (1969)

    Top cast

    Edit
    Shirley MacLaine
    Shirley MacLaine
    • Charity
    John McMartin
    John McMartin
    • Oscar
    Ricardo Montalban
    Ricardo Montalban
    • Vittorio
    Sammy Davis Jr.
    Sammy Davis Jr.
    • Big Daddy
    Chita Rivera
    Chita Rivera
    • Nickie
    Paula Kelly
    Paula Kelly
    • Helene
    Stubby Kaye
    Stubby Kaye
    • Herman
    Barbara Bouchet
    Barbara Bouchet
    • Ursula
    Suzanne Charny
    • Dancer
    Alan Hewitt
    Alan Hewitt
    • Nicholsby
    Dante DiPaolo
    • Charlie
    • (as Dante D'Paulo)
    Bud Vest
    • Dancer
    Ben Vereen
    Ben Vereen
    • Dancer
    Lee Roy Reams
    • Dancer
    Al Lanti
    • Dancer
    John Wheeler
    John Wheeler
    • Dancer
    Leon Bing
    • Model
    Leon Alton
    Leon Alton
    • Dancer
    • (uncredited)
    • Director
      • Bob Fosse
    • Writers
      • Neil Simon(from the New York stage production book by)
      • Federico Fellini(based upon the screenplay by: "Nights of Cabiria")
      • Tullio Pinelli(based upon the screenplay by: "Nights of Cabiria")
    • All cast & crew
    • See more cast details at IMDbPro

    More like this

    Liza with a Z
    8.5
    Liza with a Z
    Cabaret
    7.7
    Cabaret
    Lenny
    7.6
    Lenny
    All That Jazz
    7.8
    All That Jazz
    Star 80
    6.8
    Star 80
    Funny Girl
    7.3
    Funny Girl
    Bye Bye Birdie
    6.6
    Bye Bye Birdie
    Damn Yankees
    7.0
    Damn Yankees
    Gypsy
    7.1
    Gypsy
    Hello, Dolly!
    7.0
    Hello, Dolly!
    Victor/Victoria
    7.6
    Victor/Victoria
    Ricochet Romance
    6.9
    Ricochet Romance

    Storyline

    Edit

    Did you know

    Edit
    • Trivia
      Shirley MacLaine was working with a painful infected tooth that required root canal treatment, yet she was such a trouper that she kept it a secret so as not to hold up production. She wrote that she was in so much pain, she could't even remember filming one of the exhausting Bob Fosse dance numbers.
    • Goofs
      In the "Aloof" movement of "The Rich Man's Frug," two of the male principal dancers walk down the stairs to light a woman's cigarette, while the others dance behind them. The background choreography in this shot leads directly to the triangle formation of the next shot, and the two men are now in the middle of the group, although there was no time for them to reach that position.
    • Quotes

      Charity Hope Valentine: Wow, this place is sure full of celebrities. I'm the only one in here I've never heard of.

    • Alternate versions
      Laserdisc version contains an alternative ending. After Oscar leaves Charity, he starts to go crazy in his apartment. He then realizes that despite Charity's faults, he really can't live without her. He finds Charity on the bridge in Central Park and, thinking she's going to jump, falls into the river. Charity jumps in after Oscar and forgives him. The two then walk off together, soaking wet, through the park. Bob Fosse thought this ending was too corny, and decided to use the depressing, yet more inspirational, ending for the film's major release.
    • Connections
      Edited into Merely Marvelous: The Dancing Genius of Gwen Verdon (2019)
    • Soundtracks
      My Personal Property
      (uncredited)

      Music by Cy Coleman

      Lyrics by Dorothy Fields

      Performed by Shirley MacLaine

    User reviews86

    Review
    Top review
    7/10
    "I Don't Pop My Cork For Every Guy I See"
    I notice that uncredited, but still making a vital contribution to this film was the original Broadway lead Gwen Verdon who assisted her then husband Bob Fosse with the choreography. This has to be one of the truly unselfish acts in a business that's built on ego.

    Sweet Charity ran 608 performances on Broadway with a flock of Tony Award nominations including Gwen Verdon for the lead of Charity Hope Valentine and two Tony Awards for Bob Fosse for direction and choreography. Fosse came over to Hollywood to repeat his dual roles. But instead of Gwen doing the lead, Shirley MacLaine steps into the part and Gwen assists in the choreography. Quite frankly had she told Universal and her then husband to take their film and follow explicit directions what to do with it, who could have blamed her.

    Yet there was Gwen Verdon, helping another performer do good in a part she created. Shirley MacLaine did do good in the role and it was a return to MacLaine's own musical roots. Shirley MacLaine has done so many dramatic roles and been Oscar nominated and once a winner for them, people do forget her beginnings were musical. Had she come along ten years earlier she would have been a great musical star. As it is she does have films like Can Can, Artists and Models, and What A Way To Go where we see Shirley singing and dancing. Her first big break was on Broadway replacing Carol Haney in Pajama Game.

    Charity Hope Valentine, someone who is charging more than 10 Cents a Dance Depression prices in a dance hall keeps having the worst luck in men which is established early on when at the beginning a guy she was just getting interested in threw her off a bridge into Central Park lake and robbed her purse. The latest in a long line of romantic failures. But quite by accident she gets involved with two men, Italian film star Ricardo Montalban and insurance actuary John McMartin who is repeating his role from the original Broadway production.

    The Cy Coleman-Dorothy Fields score is a bit cut down, but you couldn't do Sweet Charity without Hey Big Spender and If They Could See Me Now. In the latter Shirley's musical talents, singing and dancing, get their full range. It must have been something however to see Gwen Verdon cavorting around the Italian film star's apartment doing that soliloquy of finally hitting the big time and wishing her dance hall girls could see here.

    As for the dance hall girls, Shirley's peers are led by best friends Chita Rivera and Paula Kelly who along with Shirley do the big production number of Hey Big Spender. Who wouldn't want a little quality time with any one of them.

    And we get a special treat with Sammy Davis, Jr. doing the Rhythm Of Life church, a satire on those who claim religious tax exempt status for some interesting beliefs. It maybe his best musical moment in film.

    The ending for a musical is rather unusual, I can't reveal, but nothing similar comes to mind at the moment. Though Shirley MacLaine is great, poor Gwen Verdon died having only had one of her Broadway hits filmed, Damn Yankees.

    But Gwen was quite the girl helping someone else score a hit with her role.
    helpful•6
    0
    • bkoganbing
    • May 21, 2009

    Details

    Edit
    • Release date
      • May 17, 1969 (Japan)
    • Country of origin
      • United States
    • Language
      • English
    • Also known as
      • Sweet Charity: The Adventures of a Girl Who Wanted to Be Loved
    • Filming locations
      • Central Park, Manhattan, New York City, New York, USA
    • Production company
      • Universal Pictures
    • See more company credits at IMDbPro

    Box office

    Edit
    • Budget
      • $20,000,000 (estimated)
    See detailed box office info on IMDbPro

    Technical specs

    Edit
    • Runtime
      2 hours 29 minutes
    • Color
      • Color
    • Aspect ratio
      • 2.35 : 1

    Related news

    Contribute to this page

    Suggest an edit or add missing content
    Shirley MacLaine and John McMartin in Sweet Charity (1969)
    Top Gap
    By what name was Sweet Charity (1969) officially released in India in English?
    Answer
    • See more gaps
    • Learn more about contributing
    Edit page

    More to explore

    View list
    List
    Editors' Picks: What to Watch Now on Netflix
    See the full list
    View image
    Photos
    Hollywood Romances: Our Favorite Couples
    See the full list
    View image
    Photos
    Double Take: Celebrity Twins
    See the full list

    Recently viewed

    Please enable browser cookies to use this feature. Learn more.
    Get the IMDb App
    • Get the IMDb App
    • Help
    • Site Index
    • IMDbPro
    • Box Office Mojo
    • IMDb Developer
    • Press Room
    • Advertising
    • Jobs
    • Conditions of Use
    • Privacy Policy
    • Interest-Based Ads
    IMDb, an Amazon company

    © 1990-2022 by IMDb.com, Inc.