Breakfast At Tiffany's...Stupid question, possible spoiler. (1 Viewer)

[Robert Floto]

I finally got around to watching Breakfast At Tiffany's last night with my fiancee. We both liked it very much, but we were both unsure of something mentioned repeatedly in the film...

They kept mentioning that Holly would get $50.00 for going to the powder room. What exactly does that mean?

Was it a prostitution reference? That doesn't seem too inline with the character...

If it was unclear to others, perhaps someone who has read the Truman Capote novel might have an answer for us.

Thanks.

 

[DaveButcher]

Others can correct me, but I always took it as a referrence to Holly being a golddigging slut and that if guys (rich guys only) wanted to date her, they paid her for it. It may have been a case of tipping the powder room girl (having never been a girl, especially one growing up in the late fifties/early sixties, I don't know exactly what the custom was/could have been).

I haven't read Capote's novel and it may have been a reference to "something" else, but I've never seen it that way.

Also my calling Holly a slut is not a slag, her character's flaws and Peppard being a male prostitute is one of the things I love about this movie. It's completely unapologetic about who these people are. It never bashes you across the face with any kind of moralism, other then when you fall in love you can't control it, and sometimes you just have to go with it.

 

[Nathan*W]

Yes, Holly is a high-class hooker, although she sometimes skips out on her client. (like the guy that follows her home and follows her up to her door)

You really should read the book; it's great. You'll really get a feel of how much Hollywood "cleaned up" the book for audiences. To give you an idea of what Breakfast at Tiffanys could have been, Capote really wanted Marilyn Monroe for the role of Holly.

 

[Zen Butler]

Holly Golightly is an escort. The extent of the relations is, of course, open for interpretation.

Capote's novella is a great companion.

 

[Carlo_M]

I thought the answer you would be looking for was, "Yes that is Mickey Rooney with his eyes taped back..."

 

[Robert Floto]

Which, strangely, didn't bother my fiancee...who is Chinese.

 

[Carlo_M]

That is strange. My girlfriend and her brother are Chinese and they reacted like "Oh my god..."

I don't think they were horrified or greviously offended, but it was more like a "what the fuh?" moment...

 

[Ray H]

Isn't Mickey Rooney's character Japanese?

I'm Chinese and as Asian I wasn't offended. I just coughed it up to "that's old school Hollywood for ya."

 

[Sam Davatchi]

Saw the movie tonight on TV. Could someone please tell me the differences of the book? I have heard that the book is very much different from the movie. They are almost 2 different entities? Because seeing the movie, the romance and the "happy ending" seem essential to the story of the *movie*. But people say that the happy ending and the romance are tacked on and not in the book. So I’m wondering what happens in the book? I just can’t think of the movie without those.

Also if I had to ask, I would ask about George Peppard’s character since Audrey Hepburn’s character is obvious from the movie. Is he a prostitute too? Because it’s never clear.

 

[Greg_M]

From what I remember (it's been a while since I've read the book) They are both "for hire" especially Paul. In the film he is being "kept" by Patrica Neal. There was a lot added for the film the original novella was quite short. From what I remember Holly wasn't as sophistcated or elegant. The ending was totally different. And I believe Paul didn't limit his services exclusively to women.

 

[Joel C]

I know it departed from the book, but I was very glad the movie had a happy ending, because otherwise, it would have been extremely depressing. I was so invested in the characters at that point that I probably wouldn't have been able to watch it again if it had ended badly. I don't dislike "non Hollywood" endings as a rule or anything, but that was one time I was glad things ended well.

 

[Brook K]

Interesting, I found it vilely racist. Something forgiveable in the 30's and 40's as "old school Hollywood", but by 1960 all involved should have known better.

Would have killed the movie for me if that hadn't already been accomplished by Pepard who is so stiff you can watch him virtually petrify onscreen.

 

[Jason_Els]

It's immediately apparent that Rooney's role is played for laughs and when I first saw it I found the characterization shocking. The laughs come (or are supposed to) from the exaggerated Japanese stereotype. Apparently Americans hadn't quite shaken the idea that the Japanese are the Orientals with bad eyesight.

This is a movie just begging for a great remake. Without the censorship, the characters could be played as written by Capote and the original, not so saccharine, ending restored to its gritty and more satisfying result.

What's stopping it? Audrey Hepburn. Had just about any other actress of the time performed the role it could easily be a candidate for a remake. I could be wrong. Perhaps it's already in the works. Yet I doubt it. Hepburn is so radiant, so joyously real yet dazzling that you have to understand they don't make 'em like that any more. Maybe it's a guy thing, I don't know. Hepburn did what Monroe did at her best; fabulously seductive, sophisticated and independent but genuinely loving with a wispy aura of vulnerability: to wit, the perfect woman. She has an angelic quality, very particularly in this film, and that aura was very really translated into her off-screen persona. I don't know that anyone could do it now, stars just aren't like that any more. They're a little duller, not so airy or delicate (ok, maybe Scarlett Johansson ).

The other factor is the setting. Breakfast at Tiffany's needs a New York of the early 60s; or at least, a pre-sexual revolution New York. The characters need the pressure of the social morals of the times to be played effectively. Now Tiffany's is still there (was there myself last week) and it looks just the same, and it wouldn't take much to make a few sets and pull a few old cars out of mothballs to redo it all. I doubt it would be the same though. We forgive older films for being products of the their age so no matter what the subject, we have to see these films as products of their age.

1960 just looks far away different from the 1940s but remember that only 3 years previous to 1960 did Eisenhower order the army to break the Little Rock school blockade. We have come a long way since then and we still have much further to travel before race isn't an issue.

 

[Ray H]

Best thing about this movie is that Moon River song.