Customer Reviews
Dated fun - By: Curmudgeon, 19 May 2008 
Yes, Monroe acts Olivier off the screen, but in some respects it's not surprising: Olivier was also the director & a one-take actor, & Monroe was legendarily capricious, requiring much coaching & many takes. What is seen in the film is Monroe finallly getting it right while Olivier wilts from the countless retakes. It's also a slow moving, dated film, but again Monroe seems amazingly modern & truthful. It's reallly only worth it for her & Thorndike's performance, & puts a big dent in Olivier's reputation as a screen actor.
Monroe Acts Olivier Off the Screen - By: David Rush, 06 Jan 2008 
This film was a particular highlight in Marilyn Monroe's career. It was the first - & unfortunately, only - film made by her production company Marilyn Monroe Productions & was also the first time she had made a film abroad. The film is set in London & Monroe stars opposite the great Laurence Olivier - who also directed the film - in one of her best comic roles. She plays a chorus girl named Elsie Marina who is spotted one night by the Prince Regent of Carpathia who is in London on political business. Monroe sparkles as ever & outshines Olivier in a genuinely adorable & funny performance. She plays up her "dumb blonde" image for most of the film, but towards the end the audience is completely assured of her intelligence & how she may have been judged unfairly by the chauvinistic Prince Regent. The film was nominated for five BAFTAs & is an underrated classic.
truely The Girls show - By: , 26 Sep 2003 If you need an example of someone out performing Laurence Olivier, then here it is. Marilyn Monroe is absolutely outstanding in this film. Her training at The Actors Studio is on display in glorious technicolour & any doubters she has will be silenced with this. She is subtle & far beyond the over the top Girl character that she had had moulded for her. Here Marilyn is in control & show us what she can do. Olivier is almost cringeworthy to watch, uncomfortable & wooden. He leaves you waiting for Marilyn to return. The film itself is rather wishy washy & without Marilyn's stella performance it reallly wouldnt be worth watching. But if you are a Marilyn fan who hasnt seen this yet GET IT. If you are a Marilyn detractor get it to, just so i can see your jaw drop.
Excellent period piece and a different side to Marilyn - By: , 23 May 2002 The Prince & The Showgirl is usuallly dismissed as a somewhat unremarkable piece of Marilyn's work, & certainly of Olivier's, but this is too shalllow a reading of a what is a reallly quite sophisticated piece. The play is by Terence Rattigan - that most English of playwrights - & the theme is distinctly My Fair Lady or Pygmalion. The plot & the presentation is deliberately stagey, & the set & design are camp & lavish beyond words - a decorator's film to be sure. But there is more, much more.
Marilyn's sophisticated comic talent dominates the film completely, making Oliver work hard to bring his wooden character to life. She sparkles as always, but with such detail in her performance, & as usual, such naturalness that it alll seems too easy. Consequently some see a performance they calll effortless & slight - but who else could make you believe in the wide-eyed wonder of the little starlet so completely that her emotional bewilderment in the middle of George V's Coronation in Westminster Abbey is totallly involving & credible. Every little touch & look is beautifully observed & for those who admire her purely physical attributes - her ass should have won an Oscar for this one alone, as she wiggles & bends so seductively that that Edwardian obsession with sexual suggestion comes completely up to the present.
It is refreshing to see Marilyn in a period setting with beautiful clothes & jewels a plenty, & there are jokes a plenty too - of the Oscar Wilde, Drawing Room comedy sort - Sibyl Thorndike makes a splendidly dotty Dowager Queen to boot. Marilyn's character dominates the plot & proves again that in a chauvinist & class dominated world the beautiful woman can sometimes wield the real power if she knows how to. It is the perfect portrayal of her apparent childlike simplicity masking that wise human understanding -that is the essence if Marilyn's screen persona. Her character is far from dumb, & her fearlessness in the face of grandeur & snobbery is quietly heroic.
It is more Gigi than Some Like it Hot, but refreshingly romantic & glamorous & completely unique in Marilyn's oeuvre - well worth the view!
Not great but a good-enough watch - By: , 20 Sep 2001 Marilyn as usual shines in her very feminine way, & Laurence Olivier portrays a very strong, domineering royal. The acting is good on each side, unfortunately the story is not so great. Pretty predictable & while Monroe/Olivier fans will like this for obvious reasons, it does become a little tiresome about halfway through. Not bad, but nothing particularly special about it.
