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The Celluloid Pantry: Food Fantasies and How to Marry a Millionaire (1953)

millionaireskylinejpg.jpgWhat are you dreaming of?

In How to Marry a Millionaire (1953), three fortune-hunting models, Pola (Marilyn Monroe, right), Schatze (Lauren Bacall, left), and Loco (Betty Grable, center), pool their resources to rent out a swank, fully furnished Sutton Place apartment (at $1000/month!) in the hopes of snagging rich husbands.

 
 

bettydreamcomp.jpg

Over a lunch of hot dogs and champagne, the three sit on the terrace and scheme. Loco, a salt-of-the-earth girl with a big appetite, thinks the fella from the deli was kind of cute, but Schatze quickly puts the kibosh on that idea. "The thing you've got to remember is this: that a gentleman you meet among the cold cuts is not as attractive as one you meet, say, in the mink department at Bergdorf's....Well, kids, where’ll we eat tonight, Stork or 21?”

That night, the three women dream in a kind of cartoon shorthand that reveals their deepest desires. Schatze goes shopping with a wealthy Texas tycoon, Pola flies on the private jet of an oil magnate, who takes her to Arabia and showers her with jewels, and, lastly, Loco is shown licking her lips as she sleeps. Instead of an elaborate dream scenario with money and millionaires, we get a simple beauty shot of a hot dog on a plate with mustard and cold beer.

What kind of food are you dreaming of? For me, right now, on the East Coast at the end of a long winter, it's got to be tomatoes or strawberries still warm from the sun.

- Nora

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Comments (4)

I LOVE these posts.

I have been dreaming of fresh produce from the farmer's market ever since the snow melted. Leafy green lettuce, Indiana tomatoes, snap beans, sweet little onions, homemade salsa, anything and everything.

posted by MEP on March 27th 2007 at 6:48am
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I'm from eastern Kentucky and wild blackberries grow ALL OVER the mountains. My grandparents had a huge patch that sprung up on their farm, and when we were little my sister and I would go out and pick a bucket for grandma (we each had a bucket, but between the two of us we'd eat a bucket ourselves, haha!). She would make the absolute BEST Blackberry Cobbler with homemade vanilla ice cream from an old wooden hand-crank...I'm drooling on my keyboard as I think about it!

posted by ktelschow on March 27th 2007 at 7:31am
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I like fresh peaches with my toaster waffles in the summer.

posted by Lady J on March 27th 2007 at 8:51am
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My favorite summer salad: fresh peaches, fresh basil, red onions and mozarella di buffala, dressed with a lemon, white pepper and garlic vinaigrette.

posted by Eve in Hochelaga on March 27th 2007 at 3:14pm
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