The film It Should Happen to You (1954), directed by George Cukor and written by Garson Kanin, transcends the narrow, lazy thinking often (unfairly) associated with the genre of romantic comedy as a whole. The story centers on Gladys Glover (Judy Holliday), a failed model who wants only to become famous. To that end, she hires an advertising agency to put her name on a billboard overlooking Columbus Circle. This act of self promotion brings Gladys widespread, though somewhat less than admiring, recognition. As she becomes increasingly wrapped up in her newfound celebrity, she begins to devote less and less attention to her would-be suitor, documentary filmmaker Pete Sheppard (Jack Lemmon). The predatory head of the advertising agency whose billboard Gladys is renting (Peter Lawford), meanwhile, makes advances on his (entirely oblivious) client. Ultimately, however, she chooses to live with Pete in blissful obscurity.
As played by Holliday, Gladys, even in her most narcissistic moments, radiates both a warmth and an overwhelming yearning for public acknowledgement that render her a remarkably compelling character. Holliday and Lemmon’s onscreen relationship, moreover, lends vivid humor to their characters’ attraction to, as well as their frustrations with, each other. In addition to the aforementioned elements, another one contributes to an even greater extent to the film’s exceptionality: the potent universality of the mental and emotional process that its heroine undergoes. Gladys, in coming to value genuine, private appreciation over detached, public visibility, reaches a conclusion at which every person must arrive in order to become a (reasonably) happy, self-accepting, and mature adult. Thus, It Should Happen to You expertly uses its central love story as the means of sharing nothing less than a compassionate and deeply resonant vision of human experience.
Here is a link to the film’s trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oCJ0fJX1i8Q
