A word of praise, too, for the late Tony Curtis—then in his transition from pretty-boy juvenile to serious actor—who, no doubt, took risks by accepting the role that was turned down by Marlon Brando. As Poitier said later, The Defiant Ones “disturbed a lot of people…and informed them.” Curtis was nominated for an Oscar, and the role clearly didn’t have a negative effect on his career. My impression is that, although he did good deeds, Curtis was not one to toot his own horn. When he graciously volunteered to come to New York for our Alexander Mackendrick (Sweet Smell of Success, Don’t Make Waves) retrospective, Curtis was less interested in serious subjects than in regaling one with the story of how the costumer on Some Like It Hot (screening here as part of The Weimar Touch in April) had pinched both his backside and that of Marilyn Monroe, and pronounced Curtis’s to be superior.

Stanley Kramer was aware that he had probably defined himself too rigidly as a deliverer of “the message film.” As he said, “I would like to express myself a little more simply and, if you will, artistically.” Still, all those Oscars are hard to argue with, and It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World demonstrated that Kramer was no Mack Sennett. When it came to ending the world in On the Beach, however, nobody did it better.