All-time Highest Graded Films
Highest Graded Films of 1955
Frank Sinatra's Graded Films
Debbie Reynolds' Graded Films
Charles Walters' Graded Films
Celeste Holm's Graded Films
Send me email
Since 06/09/00
Was it ever this easy to date beautiful women? Perhaps not, and as most of the film takes place in Frank's living room, its origins as a play are obvious.
Nonetheless, it's fun to imagine that the 1950s were like this. Ladies wore hats and fur, and men wore suits to go clubbing. Every apartment had a full service bar, and you smoked even while 'necking', because it made you look sophisticated instead of addicted. Minorities were invisible, and being single as an adult is considered an affliction with only one known cure.
Perhaps Frank Sinatra's carefree philandering existence would have continued indefinitely, were it not for two events. Childhood friend David Wayne arrives, and he lays an increasingly less subtle guilt trip on Frankie. Still, he's useful for keeping Sinatra's classy standby (Celeste Holm) entertained while Frank chases a hot but willful young thing (Debbie Reynolds)
Reynolds is The Tender Trap, and in case you forget the title, the theme is reprised on four different occasions. Sinatra took his version to #6 on the pop chart in 1956, at the height of his Capitol records glory. (Reynolds sole hit was "Tammy" in 1957, which ruled the top of the charts for ten weeks).
By this time, Sinatra no longer had anything to prove. He had made it both as a singer and an actor, and he's relaxed throughout.
Debbie Reynolds was indeed married in 1955, to Eddie Fisher, an obnoxious pop singer and teen idol who eventually left her for Elizabeth Taylor. The marriage did yield two children, one of whom was Carrie Fisher, a.k.a. Princess Leia.
Reynolds has a clear singing voice, but her perky persona lacks the melancholy and irony that Sinatra inflects upon the melody. Despite an unbecoming hairstyle, she looks scrumptuous throughout. Spoiler alert! Both Reynolds and Holm end up paired with noticeably older men, a fifties phenomena that also extended to Grace Kelly and Audrey Hepburn.