Historical mystery author *Olesya Lyuzna*joins Silver Screen Sleuths this week to discuss the 1957 Billy Wilder-directed screen adaptation of Agatha Christie’s short story and stage play of the same name, WITNESS FOR THE PROSECUTION. Starring Marlene Dietrich and Tyrone Power as the married Leonard and Christine Vole, who stand both together and at odds when Leonard is accused of murdering a wealthy spinster, while real-life married couple Charles Laughton and Elsa Lanchester play an ill barrister and his nurse, who stand both at odds and together, in their desire to defend both the guilty and innocent.
Follow Olesya online on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/olesyaisonline/
Chapters
- 00:00 Introduction and Book Series
- 02:54 Exploring the 1920s
- 07:02 Historical Parallels and Reflections
- 11:00 Witness for the Prosecution: Movie Selection
- 17:02 Characterization and Pacing in Witness for the Prosecution
- 21:48 Marlene Dietrich’s Commanding Presence
- 23:16 The Psychological Depth of the Movie
- 43:07 The Intriguing Characters and Their Complexity
- 44:20 The Blend of Screwball and Noir Elements
Transcript:
Emily Edwards (she/her) (00:00.999)
Greetings gumshoes and welcome to another episode of Silver Screen Sleuths, the podcast where I, Emily Edwards, a mystery author, talk to other mystery authors about mystery movies and television shows. It is a complicated log line that’s not an easy pitch, but the good news is that mystery writers get it, and they’re very happy to join me on the show. With me today, we have a delightful author that I’m very excited to chat with, Olesya
Leave my god, I screwed it up, even though you just told me how to pronounce it two seconds ago. I’m so sorry. That the say it for me again, please. I’m sorry.
Olesya Lyuzna (00:30.789)
Ha ha ha.
Olesya Lyuzna (00:38.169)
Olesya Lyuzna
Emily Edwards (she/her) (00:39.963)
Olesya Lyuzna close enough? I’m sorry, I’m try I I feel so shitty when I do stuff like this. I’m so sorry. How are ya?
Olesya Lyuzna (00:43.064)
Yeah, perfect.
No.
Olesya Lyuzna (00:53.016)
Ho ho ho ho I’m fantastic, Emily. Thank you for having me.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (00:57.602)
That horrible, horrible introduction that I’m gonna keep because it makes me look really crappy, and I’m always just like, you know what? Fine.
Olesya Lyuzna (01:03.201)
No.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (01:08.327)
We were we were introduced sort of through the internet thanks to my f longtime friend Nekesa Afia who was on a couple of weeks ago to talk about DIAL M FOR MURDER. And you guys know each other from are you are you also Canadian?
Olesya Lyuzna (01:23.7)
Yes. Yeah. So we have the sort of fortune of being two nineteen twenties mystery writers, both based in Toronto. and so we met through a mutual friend who said, Hey, I know someone who writes in in the same genre. I think you’ll like her and we’ve been best friends ever since. So yeah, it’s been great.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (01:39.191)
That is so cool. Like I your book series is okay. So both of you have like the greatest covers and you just have like and you have a new book out now or coming out and the cover is just absolutely just like gorgeous, breathtakingly cool. can you tell us a little bit about your series, your sleuth, and and why you chose the nineteen twenties?
Olesya Lyuzna (01:51.118)
Mm.
Olesya Lyuzna (02:02.549)
Yeah, for sure. So I mean, first of all, the cover for my latest book, Liars in Paradise, is pink, which made me personally very happy. so there’s that going for it. so I write the Ginny Duggan mysteries. I have two books out so far. Glitter in the Dark is the first, and Liars in Paradise came out just now in August 2026. and it follows Ginny Duggan, who is a messy bisexual advice columnist, turned sleuth.
so she drinks a lot, she does drugs, she parties, she falls for all the wrong people, but ultimately at the end of the day, she does solve the crime, you know, for better or worse. And it’s just been a lot of fun writing her. I think. so I started the series during the pandemic, which was my sort of creative awakening, I guess, as for many of us, I think. and I was just, you know, yearning for the parties, for the people, and I feel like that really comes through, especially in the first book.
I wanted to get out of the 2020s and into another decade that’s a bit more fun and less locked down. and the the 1920s have always drawn me. It’s kind of hard to say why the 20s specifically. I’ve pondered this here and there in interviews and just on my own time. I’ve just always loved, you know, the fashion, the music, the slang.
and the more I learn about it too, the more kind of parallels I find with the modern age. So I always kind of just want to make it feel fresh and fun and modern for people reading it today. and to kind of, you know, make historical fiction feel more fun. Cause I think many people have a bit of a prejudice against it. You know, it’s it’s historical. It’s why do I need to read this? This happened a hundred years ago. so that’s kind of my my big my reason why, I guess, for for writing the series.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (03:40.861)
Totally. I I also love delving into like the language and just taking people that we know and putting them into sort of situations or context that a lot of people really, really misread. So like my series takes place in the nineteen fifties. Nineteen twenties is the exact same way, which is a lot of people think that, everything was Victorian, you know, where you have like the stayed.
Olesya Lyuzna (03:55.841)
Yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (04:06.074)
You know, very like we don’t talk about bodies, we don’t talk about sex, we don’t talk about drugs, we don’t talk about drinking, just that very strict understanding of manners and the way people interact. And, you know, it’s like the 1920s was wild everywhere. You know, we it was so similar to now. Everybody’s flush with money and then suddenly not flush with money and dealing with you know,
Olesya Lyuzna (04:09.178)
yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (04:32.92)
sh restrictions on intoxicants and sex and or no restrictions on intoxicants and sex and things like that. And it’s just a really, really interesting time.
Olesya Lyuzna (04:43.412)
Hmm, yeah, yeah, exactly. And I think it’s it’s just so interesting bringing things to light that, you know, might be forgotten to through the years. one big thing that I think not many people know is how vibrant queer culture was, especially in, you know, the bigger cities like New York, where most of my books are set. you know, there was this drag ball at Hamilton Lodge that started in the mid-19th century and kept going. And by the late 20s it reached like 7,000 people. and so
People would show up in these elaborate costumes. It was really this event not just for the queer community, but kind of beyond. It was sort of the place to be, and the cops would actually kind of protect the attendees rather than try to break it up. So I think showing these like little flashes of, you know, not just the repression, which I think is also important to kind of show how that evolves, but also the glimmers of hope and the, you know, the vibrancy there. I think that’s really affirming and empowering for people reading it today, where you know, history is very much.
cyclical and it’s not just like a straight line going in one direction.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (05:40.509)
Absolutely, absolutely. I mean, especially when the nineteen twenties when you’re talking about like the interwar periods where you have the modernists who are really trying to push, you know, they’ve lived through World War World War One and they’ve lived through all this like huge trauma and it really affects how they want to, you know, position the future and how they want to make to mold the future so that never happens again. And of course, you know, in the nineteen twenties, you’re already starting to see grumblings of of Europe, you know.
Olesya Lyuzna (05:56.771)
Mm-hmm.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (06:09.744)
going down the the fascism hole that it’s gonna go down in about 10 years. And that sort of helplessness that a lot of the people were feeling in those interwar years of really, really trying to, you know, punt the ball down the field as much as possible when it comes to progress. but also at the same time creating laws about, our, you know, that is the time. This is just a diatribe that I’m going on. But, you know, it’s also the time of like,
Olesya Lyuzna (06:36.524)
Yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (06:38.734)
extreme eugenics and and playing around with things of like who is the right person that we want to take into the future. It’s such an interesting time to to set anything because all of those things are happening politically all at once. And then by the time the 1950s roll around the after the Second World War, everybody was like, no experimentation, nothing different, nothing unusual, nothing that is aberrant. We’re just going to try to erase all of that from
Olesya Lyuzna (06:40.611)
Mm.
Olesya Lyuzna (06:45.207)
Yes.
Olesya Lyuzna (07:02.678)
Mm-hmm.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (07:06.726)
From culture and it’s just a really, really interesting short time span for all of that to happen.
Olesya Lyuzna (07:10.926)
Yeah. It’s surprising that so much happens so quickly. I always kind of just marvel, even within, you know, a couple of years, so many changes, new laws, changes in attitudes. I think it makes me reflect sort of differently on sort of the recent past as well. And it makes me wonder how people will think about our decade in hindsight, which I don’t know if that’s a happy or a scary topic to to descend on, but it makes you wonder, you know.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (07:32.344)
R right?
Drag ball is a really interesting thing to choose up or to to pick up because that’s so fascinating. I did not know about that. But you know, you also think about the introduction of you know, ball culture in the late 1980s, early 1990s queer space. And of course, like Paris’s burning is such like an absolutely essential watch to understand of just like the underground queer culture that’s always been in existence and cannot get stifled.
Olesya Lyuzna (07:39.094)
Mm.
Olesya Lyuzna (07:51.831)
Mm.
Mm.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (08:04.9)
No matter how much people try, it’s it’s just a r I had no idea that that rooted back all the way even into the nineteen twenties and possibly even earlier.
Olesya Lyuzna (08:07.054)
Anyway
Olesya Lyuzna (08:14.27)
Hmm, yeah, yeah. No, it’s it’s really fascinating. I think the more you dig, the more you kind of learn. And I think even the fact that the drag balls started up in the mid-19th century surprised me initially. I think they were started by a a black fraternity and they were allowed to go on for all these years, again, like throughout sort of the Victorian years, which many people would probably not equate with drag balls happening anywhere.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (08:31.791)
Mm-hmm.
Olesya Lyuzna (08:35.538)
so I definitely I don’t know as much about the earlier centuries as I do about the twenties, but it makes me curious to, you know, keep digging and see how far we can get.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (08:45.156)
It’s so cool. I’m gonna go and snap up your books because that is just like absolutely fascinating. Like I’m just so excited about that. And then what’s weird is that I mean, Witness for the Prosecution, which is the movie that we’re talking about today, it it written by Agatha Christie in 1925 as a short story, written in by Agatha Christie as a play in the early 1950s, and then turned into this movie by the late 1950s. And it is also something that
Really, really plays with staid gender roles and the and you know, just marriage as a construct. It’s so fascinating. Like you gave me a couple movies that you were interested in talking about. And why did Witness for the Prosecution kind of like come onto the list?
Olesya Lyuzna (09:22.082)
Yeah.
Olesya Lyuzna (09:34.348)
Yeah, so I’ve been on a very big Billy Wilder kick. I feel like, you know, I’ve I’ve been savoring his movies slowly throughout my lifetime. I think my first one was probably double indemnity because, you know, I’m a big noir girl and that was sort of the the thing to watch. But I feel almost like I don’t wanna run out of Billy Wilder movies and eventually I will. I feel that way with with some books too, you know, especially with authors who are no longer with us. It’s like I just wanna really take my time because one day this will all end. But anyway, on a lighter note,
Emily Edwards (she/her) (09:47.289)
Mm-hmm.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (09:53.478)
Totally.
Olesya Lyuzna (10:04.574)
you know, I’d seen his noirs, I’d seen his comedy sort of on the more screwball side. And then this movie just kind of came across, you know, caught my eye because I am a big Tyrone Power fangirl. so I I saw a lot of his movies from the sort of earlier years, the 30s, the 40s. He’s very much kind of like a pretty boy. And I was reading all these kind of old Hollywood books and memoirs about how badly he was trying to break out of that role and how studios wouldn’t have
Emily Edwards (she/her) (10:16.71)
Yes.
Olesya Lyuzna (10:32.056)
Cast him as anything other than a pretty boy. he like served in the war. He kind of broke out of it with Nightmare Alley, but that movie wasn’t promoted as much. So a lot of frustration. So I was just really excited to see him in this role that I think is just so perfect for him. It’s kind of, he’s still very much like the charmer, but there’s you know an edge there. and yeah, I’m honestly, this is probably I can’t really think of too many courtroom dramas that I’ve personally seen, so I’m like by no means an expert.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (10:34.331)
Mm-hmm.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (10:49.819)
Mm-hmm.
Olesya Lyuzna (11:00.066)
But this one, something about it just caught my eye. I feel like it’s very theatrical. It feels very much like a maybe it’s the play underneath it all, but there’s something very like dramatic about it. Do you kind of get that too?
Emily Edwards (she/her) (11:07.631)
Yeah.
I totally I I really didn’t realize just how much of the text and how much of the screen time was going to be taking place in this extremely foreign to me court environment, you know, because you know you go into courts in the US at least and it’s it’s very it’s shockingly informal. You know, like you most people are there, your jury is not in suits and ties, you’re you’re trying
Olesya Lyuzna (11:24.118)
Mm-hmm.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (11:38.748)
I just had jury duty last year. You know, I go going through Voidare and thank they didn’t choose me. I don’t want to say thankfully, but they didn’t choose me. It’s very hard to apparently get chosen for a jury if you’re a crime writer when you tell them that that’s your job. And it was also a drunk driving case. And I used to work in the wine and spirits industry. And I was like, this is a little bit complex for me. Didn’t get chosen, but you know, in LA, you know, the the courtrooms are extremely dirty. There’s tech everywhere. It’s
Olesya Lyuzna (11:41.154)
really?
Olesya Lyuzna (11:50.786)
no.
Olesya Lyuzna (12:05.87)
Mm-hmm.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (12:07.527)
freezing cold. So everybody is trying not to like shiver while they’re telling everybody there’s and it’s just like a it’s just a tumultuous, like unpleasant experience. And then when you go through this, you’re seeing just the formality of it with the wigs and the robes and the, you know, and he’s standing up, you know, like in the box the entire time. And you’re and it’s just feels so regal in a way that, you know, courtroom stuff.
in America, or at least media now, does not feel even remotely have that semblance of, you know, sort of like, and then we might take you out to the like the platform and behead you at the end, which, you know, for some reason all British courtroom stuff seems to have.
Olesya Lyuzna (12:39.094)
Mm-hmm.
Olesya Lyuzna (12:48.553)
Yeah.
Yeah. No, I got that same feeling too. And I feel like at the end of it too, I had to look up how much of it was sort of contrived for the movie and how much of it was actually kind of conventional for British courtrooms. My favorite part was how they addressed each other as my learned friend. I thought I thought that they were just being like really kind of like sniffy and sarcastic. I kind of felt felt like it was, you know, like an improvisation, but apparently that’s conventional in British courtrooms.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (13:04.882)
Mm-hmm.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (13:08.485)
Yes.
Olesya Lyuzna (13:19.542)
Which I also thought was very funny ’cause I I could s I could picture, you know, them saying that in very different tones of voice, like in the movie, right?
Emily Edwards (she/her) (13:26.437)
Yeah. totally. Like I you know, and it’s it’s such an it again, I’m not a lawyer and I’ve been in courts twice in my entire li and both of the time it was me not getting chosen for a jury. So like I’ve I’ve never experienced this and I can only imagine how daunting because he’s Tyrone Power is so cavalier when his character is introduced. He’s just like, you know, my wife suggested I get a lawyer, she’s a dumb broad, you know, and you’re just like
Olesya Lyuzna (13:49.869)
Mm-hmm.
Olesya Lyuzna (13:54.185)
Yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (13:55.792)
And you know, he’s just so like, blase, nothing’s gonna stick to me. I’m made of Teflon, I’m Tyrone Power. And you’re just kind of like, I love this characterization of it. And as a person who heads up for a 70-year-old movie, is is very guilty throughout the entire thing. He’s he it’s it’s such an interesting thing for Agatha Christie to write, who is.
Olesya Lyuzna (13:59.309)
Yeah.
Olesya Lyuzna (14:02.775)
Okay.
Olesya Lyuzna (14:14.958)
Yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (14:23.899)
An extremely moralizing author. She is very happy to tell you when someone’s guilty that she thinks they’re guilty and they should go to jail forever.
Olesya Lyuzna (14:27.265)
Mm-hmm.
Olesya Lyuzna (14:34.401)
Yes.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (14:38.961)
You know, like so I was wondering like w ha do you read had you read the story or the play that this is based off of before? ‘Cause I haven’t. Okay.
Olesya Lyuzna (14:38.99)
Yeah.
Olesya Lyuzna (14:47.422)
No, no. I went in fully blind and I hadn’t looked up any spoilers or anything, so it was actually kind of insane. I feel like I’ve I went into it with I mean, I knew it was based on an Agatha P Christie story and play, but I still, you know, it’s an older movie. You kind of get a little smug as a modern viewer. You think, I’ve seen it all, I’ve seen all the twists, but still the like multiple twists. And I think what especially shocked me was like the the character work because each character is
Emily Edwards (she/her) (15:06.481)
Yeah.
Olesya Lyuzna (15:15.512)
kind of like multiple things at the same time, but at the same time they don’t seem inconsistent. So they’re kind of like consistently inconsistent, I want to say. Yeah. And I think that takes a lot of work just for the script and also for the director and for the actors. And I just kept kind of re-watching it to figure out how they were able to do it. Cause like you said, you know, with Tyrone Powers’ character, you kind of can you can believe different things at different parts of the movie. And at the same time it all makes sense at the end. It’s all very consistent in its way, which I thought was remarkable.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (15:22.895)
Yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (15:45.34)
Yeah, every thread gets sewn up at the end, which is is kind of unusual for movies of this age. I feel like Billy Wilder, who co sort of co-wrote adapted it to screen, and then there was another screenplay sort of written off of his adaptations, very complicated. You know, WGA rules are all over the place. But Billy Wilder had basically shepherded this from play to screen and then ended up directing it. And, you know, he’s such an incredible
Olesya Lyuzna (15:51.245)
Okay.
Olesya Lyuzna (16:05.006)
The more.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (16:15.345)
like author levels of even though we don’t use that word for like, you know, old Hollywood guys. He’s so adept at translating things to screen and building that tension and really driving home the fact that these are, these are no good people. and everybody in the scene has their own reasons for being there. And I think that Charles Laughton’s character, who is like the main barrister
Olesya Lyuzna (16:39.822)
Yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (16:44.881)
Who just survived a heart attack and is just so ready to prove to his nurse, Miss Plimsoul, who’s played by his actual real life wife, Elsa Lanchester. And so when they’re bickering, it is the most realistic, like married people bickering I’ve ever seen for screen. And he’s so damned.
Olesya Lyuzna (16:52.142)
I love that so much. my god.
Olesya Lyuzna (17:02.197)
Yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (17:09.725)
Proud of himself that he is going to go back and going to do this no matter what his bitch wife says, you know? And it’s it’s really comical the way that they fight and how over the top they are on screen in a way that was like almost uncomfortable for me while watching.
Olesya Lyuzna (17:16.898)
Yeah.
Olesya Lyuzna (17:21.4)
Mm-hmm.
Olesya Lyuzna (17:30.004)
Hmm, yeah. Yeah, I agree. I think the first 15 minutes of the movie feel sort of different from the rest and maybe almost misleading. And I think you know, Billy Wilder could have gone so many different ways with it, right? You have your barrister, you have your case, you know, bring in Leonard Vol and let’s get on with it, right? Instead, he takes all this time to give us, I don’t want to call it exposition because I feel like it’s all useful, right? but we really get to know Charles Laughton’s character.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (17:48.252)
Yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (17:54.748)
Yeah.
Olesya Lyuzna (17:58.318)
you know, he’s this crotchety guy. He doesn’t even want to take the case at first. My favorite is just, you know, the lengths he will go to to get a cigar. and that’s like the motivation to even have the conversation with like Leonard Bowles’ representative is the guy who has the cigars in his pocket and the camera zoom into those cigars. Hilarious. So it’s all very real, all very like lived in, and so many like fun little touches, like the the chair, the motorized chair that goes up.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (18:15.441)
Mm-hmm.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (18:27.557)
Mm-hmm.
Olesya Lyuzna (18:27.959)
the stairs and how much he enjoys going up and down. Like all these points are kind of, you know, they’re not essential to the plot, but so essential to the character. And I think the bickering plays the same part too. Like we kind of see him in this more casual environment and it’s it’s really funny, but very different I think, tone wise from the actual, you know, the case and how he acts during the case. So I found that pretty interesting.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (18:50.459)
Yeah. Yeah, no, I w you know, it makes me think about someone who writes books this day and age. And I’m like, our editors would make us cut that out. You know what I mean? Like so much, it’s it’s very odd now that like the pacing of things requires you to l basically if you could have the murder happen on the first page of your book, editors would be like, Finally, you nailed it. You know what I mean? Like
Olesya Lyuzna (18:56.801)
Mm-hmm.
Yeah. I know.
Olesya Lyuzna (19:11.437)
Mm.
Olesya Lyuzna (19:14.912)
Yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (19:16.507)
The amount of buildup that we’re allowed now in narratives is extremely small. And I wonder how much, you know, the runtime for this movie is about two hours. And so it’s much longer than modern movies now. Like when you are writing a script, you’re expected to have things that are 90 pages or less, and that’s a minute per page, essentially. So you are shooting for 90 minutes or less, just people have no attention span.
Olesya Lyuzna (19:22.701)
Mm-hmm.
Olesya Lyuzna (19:27.629)
Mm-hmm.
Olesya Lyuzna (19:38.004)
Mm-hmm.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (19:46.621)
And I was noticing just how kind of bored I was almost was for the first big you know the first 15 minutes when they’re doing all these hijinks. And I’m just like, do we frickin’ need this? And the answer is yes, because it’s adorable. And it’s it really actually lends like so much understanding to why the barrister does what he does at the end of the movie, and it which we’ll get to later. and it’s just it’s really delightful. And
Olesya Lyuzna (19:50.837)
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Ha ha ha ha.
Olesya Lyuzna (20:11.817)
Mm-hmm.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (20:15.678)
But the like you’re saying, like it kind of messes with your understanding of the tone of the movie because they are extr they’re acting extremely broadly. Like Charles Laughton and Elsa Lanchester were old enough. I mean, Elsa Lanchester is best known for being the bride of Frankenstein. We’re talking like silent movie style grandiosity in emotions and lines and movements and delivery. And it’s it’s a little off-putting.
Olesya Lyuzna (20:22.269)
Mm.
Olesya Lyuzna (20:26.615)
Hmm.
Olesya Lyuzna (20:39.735)
Mm-hmm.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (20:45.798)
To me at least, as like a modern audience, I was just like, it feels almost like a British pantomime kind of like levels of like ha ha ha ha ha ha hijinks that happen in the early parts of the movie. And I I don’t know, did it was it making you uncomfortable at all? Or is that just like me really going for like just get to the noir already, you know, Billy?
Olesya Lyuzna (20:46.55)
Mm.
Olesya Lyuzna (20:51.34)
Yes.
Olesya Lyuzna (21:06.605)
I mean, I think I’ve also reached that point where I’m like, where’s the body? You know, just give me, give me a body. And I think it’s it’s very much like you said, what modern movies and books prime us for because attention spans are getting shorter. If you can make it, you know, like real size, bite-sized, ideally, that’s best. I do feel like I was annoyed, but I I think I would have been annoyed if the movie weren’t as good as it was, because I noticed this a lot just across the board in older movies that they are slower.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (21:11.4)
Yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (21:29.982)
Mm.
Olesya Lyuzna (21:34.456)
But then it really, I feel like the quality of the script and the acting kind of makes or breaks it for me. Where here I was like, you know, okay. I think as soon as Leonard Bull came in, and then especially, I think the moment that clinched it for was Marlene Dietrich’s entrance. That’s kind of where everything sort of starts turning, I think. Because until then it’s kind of, he’s like, I don’t know, I’m fine, I’m innocent, don’t bother. And then we have all the hijinks, and then boom, his wife shows up on the scene, and it’s all kind of.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (21:48.777)
my god.
Olesya Lyuzna (22:02.381)
A little mysterious, a little unclear.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (22:05.138)
She’s incredible. And I like there’s no other word to describe Marlene Dietrich walking in because she’s so tall and she has that bearing, and her shoulders are so wide and so square, and she’s got the cheekbones and the jawline. And you’re just like, my God, you’re a goddess. And she walks into this room with Tyrone Power does not even try to put on a British accent. He’s just American the entire time. And but you have like the two, like kind of
Olesya Lyuzna (22:17.772)
Yes.
Olesya Lyuzna (22:23.406)
Yes.
Olesya Lyuzna (22:31.055)
Mm-hmm.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (22:34.202)
All the sort of British stereotypes that they’re playing into with the barrister and and the people and the old ancient men who work in his office, and then like the older nurse who’s very fluffy, Miss Marple, you know, like overbearing. And so they’re not really painting British people in a particularly positive light, or at least not aging well 70 years later. So you have like the nefarious shitty American, and then you have these kind of like.
Olesya Lyuzna (22:42.237)
Yes.
Olesya Lyuzna (22:46.87)
Mm-hmm.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (23:01.144)
out of touch British people. And then you have Marlene Dietrich walks in and she’s just like, I’m the only person who knows the way of the world. And you’re just like, I love you so much.
Olesya Lyuzna (23:09.205)
Ha ha ha.
Olesya Lyuzna (23:16.535)
I know.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (23:16.734)
She’s so commanding.
Olesya Lyuzna (23:19.309)
I don’t know how she does that. I I feel like I mean she was unique, I feel like, for her time and her cohort of actors, but I also feel like it’s this added sort of older Hollywood mystique that I don’t think I don’t know of many actresses today. Like if we were doing a remake of Witness for the Prosecution, who has that aura, you know? No.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (23:37.993)
There’s no one. Like, there’s absolutely no one who has just that absolute like cause I’m thinking, like, obviously he did double indemnity, which has Barbara Stanwyck in it, who also has that sort of like, I love Barbara Stanwyck. Our our politics are miles apart. She was like super deeply like conservative Republican.
Olesya Lyuzna (23:46.752)
And then yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (23:57.843)
Don’t pay for anybody. I, you know, I bootstrapped it. And why would I help anybody else in the future? And I’m just kind of like, screw you, Stanny. But like sh her her film presence is that just like I walk into a room and no matter if it’s comedy, drama, whatever, I am in charge of this scene. And Dietrich has obviously that same uncanny ability. Like she her introductory, her secondary scene, which is like when you introduce
Olesya Lyuzna (24:01.981)
Mm.
Olesya Lyuzna (24:14.957)
Mm.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (24:25.458)
her character to Vol to Leonard and she’s playing in accordion and essentially getting sexually assaulted by a randy crowd of of of soldiers. And she still manages to have this unbelievable dignity when someone rips her clothing off. And you’re just like, the I believe that Marlene Dietrich can survive that and come out on top. Like she has that uncanny ability to sh to
Olesya Lyuzna (24:41.643)
Yes.
Olesya Lyuzna (24:51.746)
Mm-hmm.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (24:55.154)
To rise above.
Olesya Lyuzna (24:56.587)
Yeah, yeah, exactly. I mean, it it really it couldn’t have been anybody else, I think, in that part. Also, I mean, fun fact for that scene. I’m not sure if that would that scene was written, you know, before or later, but I I caught this fact that the scene with the ripped pants required a hundred and forty-five extras, thirty-eight stunt men, and ninety thousand dollars. And the goal was to show one of her famous legs. So I feel like I feel like
Emily Edwards (she/her) (25:13.256)
Mm-hmm.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (25:21.586)
Ha.
Olesya Lyuzna (25:23.799)
I mean it makes sense to the plot, I guess, ish, but I feel like there was intention there too, you know?
Emily Edwards (she/her) (25:29.714)
yeah. Like it’s it’s this really interesting way to be like, he’s coming to rescue her, but because it’s Marlene Dietrich, you know she doesn’t need rescuing and she’s allowing herself to be rescued by this man. She’s like, you want to feel something. You look like an American GI who’s got access to coffee, sugar, tea, whatever, like things that I need while living in my bombed-out.
Olesya Lyuzna (25:43.905)
Yes.
Olesya Lyuzna (25:53.28)
And then
Emily Edwards (she/her) (25:56.777)
Home that you all did to me. And she’s like, fine. It’s so easily set up as a scene of mutual use that, like, it’s it’s again, only Billy Wilder or a director of that caliber could set up that scene because I don’t know about you, there was no sex in that in those scenes whatsoever. It was so anti-romantic.
Olesya Lyuzna (25:57.528)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Olesya Lyuzna (26:04.448)
Mm-hmm.
Olesya Lyuzna (26:20.097)
Mm-hmm.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (26:24.638)
I don’t know, like did you get any chemistry between them at all?
Olesya Lyuzna (26:29.259)
No, it was kind of strange. like you said, it felt very transactional to me. And I think it’s it’s funny because I guess he is compelled by her, but I almost feel like he’s compelled by her presence and the attention she’s getting from everybody else. Like I don’t really see romance or sexual attraction necessarily. I mean attraction probably, but it’s it’s very much Leno, she is the star and he kind of like wants her as the star. And
Emily Edwards (she/her) (26:57.296)
Yeah, ’cause other men want her.
Olesya Lyuzna (26:59.229)
Exactly, exactly. And the other thing that I found interesting about that scene was that it felt like a bit a bit of a clue into his character where the the the men are attacking her and he does absolutely nothing to like stop them. But he kind of like leaves and then comes back when she’s alone and that felt very calculated to me and sort of cowardly I guess or maybe smart, I don’t know, depending on how you’re looking at it, but he’s that kind of guy.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (27:10.232)
Yeah. Yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (27:22.12)
Totally. Yeah, no, you’re right. Cause like if you think about like American war hero, he’s gonna go in there. Like, if you give that part to Cary Grant or like Rock Hudson or something like that, they’re gonna put break apart the men and start throwing punches to like save this woman’s honor. And he’s just like, I’m gonna stand back until they’re done doing whatever they want to this broad. And you’re just kind of like,
Olesya Lyuzna (27:28.349)
Mm-hmm. Yeah, yeah.
Yeah.
Olesya Lyuzna (27:38.218)
Yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (27:46.921)
That’s really evil. Like, but he’s just gonna go in in there and and supposedly pick up the pieces until he realizes that like it didn’t shatter her. And then he’s totally intrigued by the fact that this woman has the ability to be pawed at to the extent that she has been. Her the entire bar is destroyed, and she’s still walking around as though like she’s completely unscathed. Like she’s incredible in this movie.
Olesya Lyuzna (28:14.124)
Yes, yes, no, exactly.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (28:17.462)
which is why it is not at all surprising when like our first twist kind of happens. And there’s something so modern about this. You know, it’s like we’re talking in the era of you know, Gone Girl being named like the best thriller of the 21st century, which I think is totally well deserved. And then we’re so used now, used to now these huge, like what’s gonna happen twists that happen on screen. And I can only imagine.
Olesya Lyuzna (28:24.621)
Mm.
Yeah.
Olesya Lyuzna (28:34.285)
Yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (28:47.228)
That her coming in as the titular witness for the prosecution against her husband, air quotes, it was so shocking to haze code era audiences where wifies are just supposed to be good little wifeies and they’re and nothing else. So we’re like, were you did you know the twist before you kind of started watching the movie?
Olesya Lyuzna (28:51.822)
Maybe.
Olesya Lyuzna (29:10.07)
Yeah.
Olesya Lyuzna (29:15.642)
No, I mean, I feel like part of me wondered because Dietrich is such a strong character that I I could not imagine her just playing, you know, a meek wifey at the same time as like maybe that’s the twist. I think for me it it honestly came even earlier where like I think the first like line from her or whatever, Charles Laughton’s like, there’s a lot of of to do about her being a foreigner. She’s like, these foreign wives, I’ll have to bring the smelling salts, she’ll be so hysterical. And she’s like, No, like I don’t need that, or like the smelling salts puff up my face or something.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (29:26.611)
Mm-hmm.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (29:45.245)
Yeah.
Olesya Lyuzna (29:45.41)
completely cold, like unemotional, unbothered. and then I think the first point where she’s just like, you know, she’s she can neither confirm nor deny whether her husband came home. That’s what he told her to say. So I feel like that first element of doubt as to, you know, what her intentions are, that was quite surprising to me, because she is who the whole sort of testimony may or may not hinge on. And her testifying for the prosecution was kind of crazy and and really unexpected.
Yeah. So I don’t know. on the one hand, since it was Dietrich, I couldn’t really picture her kind of standing by her man till the end. Yeah, like that would be very out of character. but yeah, I I I did I did read this tidbit. So because her performance and I mean there is well, I think we’ll probably get to to one of the spoilers on the complexity of her performance or performances.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (30:22.227)
no. Yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (30:35.081)
Yeah.
Olesya Lyuzna (30:39.586)
But she was so sure that she would get nominated for an Oscar, but I think she didn’t because they were afraid to like give away the twist to like show that her role is more than just, you know. and she even like pre recorded a video for like a Vegas event or something. She was like, I’ve been nominated, but then she didn’t get nominated and she was like crushed, which I can imagine because she did so well.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (30:49.044)
Yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (30:54.162)
Emily Edwards (she/her) (31:03.207)
Yeah, it it’s a brilliant performance from her. And I, you know, I should probably look up to see who was nominated for best actress you know, after 1957 because she wasn’t. And you know, the the twist, again, sorry guys, s 70-year-old movie. You’re just gonna have to deal with this. Of, you know, she pretends to be a
Olesya Lyuzna (31:19.518)
Yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (31:24.455)
Cockney woman, admittedly, Cockney accent, not Marlene Dietrich’s strong suit, but she she does a good job of it. She puts on this disguise and she calls the barrister, the defense lawyer to the seedy bar. And she’s just like, I happen to have this is so Agatha Christie, where she’s just like, some like urchin happens to have, you know, the, the, the information we need. And she hands over these love letters from Marlene Dietrich’s,
Olesya Lyuzna (31:41.88)
Yeah, you know.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (31:53.374)
wife character to this random man named Max. And she’s like, you know, I’m gonna lie on the stand and then we can be together forever. And by the introduction of these letters to the defense as evidence, Vol, which I love that he’s named after a rat, Vol gets, you know, acquitted and because of the laws of Double Jeopardy, he can’t be tried again. And, you know, even though he obviously murdered this poor woman.
Olesya Lyuzna (32:11.122)
I know.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (32:21.301)
this older woman who left him boatloads of cash. And she’s just like, now we can run away together forever. And apparently, they really did not want to spoil the fact that she plays these dual characters, both the German wife and the and the cockney urchin who just happens to stumble upon unmailed letters between this woman and her non existent boyfriend. And and I feel so bad because she does deliver everything fully.
She is incredible in this movie. And it’s one of those things where you kind of realize that in the 1950s, the Oscars were a marketing tool, but not to the extent that they are today. and that we’re used to seeing like the second it gets nominated for something, it’s like Oscar nominated, you know, like whatever. You know, even it’s like you got.
Olesya Lyuzna (33:06.326)
Hm.
Olesya Lyuzna (33:13.602)
Yeah, yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (33:14.471)
nominated for sound design. Like it’s not the same thing as like best picture. What the hell are you talking about? Oscar nominated Transformers movie. Like it’s sound mixing. I’m proud for the mixers, but it’s not the same thing. Like, but they didn’t do that with this, which is just absolutely kind of bananas.
Olesya Lyuzna (33:32.449)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. No, I totally agree. And I think kind of coming back to that very like Christie-ish twist with the urchin coming in. I feel like I personally didn’t recognize her when she was in disguise. and later I was really shocked by the twist. But the one thing that gave me pause was like, how late are you able to enter things into evidence during a trial?
Emily Edwards (she/her) (33:47.219)
Yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (33:55.911)
Right?
Olesya Lyuzna (33:57.097)
This is just like they’re about to give their final statements and then Charles Laughton’s character is like, Wait, wait, I have these letters and then they just go ahead with it.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (34:05.721)
Yeah, I know. And i I love how many old things kind of rely on handwriting as like something that we’re gonna, you know, it’s it’s definitely her handwriting. And you’re just like, no, it that’s not evidence. That’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard. I’m trying to look up to see who was nominated for best actress.
Olesya Lyuzna (34:25.579)
Yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (34:33.085)
Because it should have been Marlene Dietrich, and it absolutely wasn’t. So the best actress nominees for the movies that came out in 1957 were Lana Turner for Payton Place, Elizabeth Taylor in Raintree Country, which I’ve never heard of, Anna Magnani for Wild is the Wind, Deborah Kerr for Heaven Knows.
And the winner was Paul Newman’s wife, Joanne Woodward, for the three faces of Eve.
Olesya Lyuzna (35:08.877)
Interesting.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (35:09.001)
I am not an expert in classic cinema and I have never heard of any of these movies and I feel I’ve heard of Payton Place, obviously, but like other than that, I got nothing. Poor Marlene.
Olesya Lyuzna (35:17.292)
Yeah, same.
Yeah. I mean based j judging based on the titles, I feel these feel more melodrama to me. I might be totally, you know, off base, but I wonder if there’s something to that. Like were you more likely to be nominated as a woman if you were playing the lead in like a very sort of women’s film?
Emily Edwards (she/her) (35:29.513)
Yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (35:33.063)
Yeah. ‘Cause
Emily Edwards (she/her) (35:40.576)
yeah, no, that’s a really good point. Cause this movie, Witness for the Prosecution, was nominated for Boatloads of Oscars. So it was nominated for Best Picture, was nominated for Best Director, Best Actor for Charles Laughton, not for Tyrone Power, Best Supporting Actress for Elsa Lanchester, best film editing and best sound recording, which is again really weird when you think about like these nineteen fifties movies. Yeah, no, yeah. They didn’t win any. Yeah.
Olesya Lyuzna (35:48.182)
Mm.
Olesya Lyuzna (35:55.597)
Mm-hmm.
Olesya Lyuzna (36:03.884)
How did they judge that?
Emily Edwards (she/her) (36:10.087)
I don’t know.
Olesya Lyuzna (36:11.221)
Interesting.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (36:13.821)
Yeah, it it’s funny. My my husband works in like the sound aspect of movies. And so when you get to the point where it’s like, can anybody explain the difference between sound editing and sound mixing? And even guys who work in sound are usually like, No, we we don’t. Like, like, no, not really. It’s like it’s me sound editing is like making sure that the gunshot sounds line up with the gunfire that you see. And then sound mixing is making sure that the gunshots are really loud over like everything else. And that’s literally the only difference.
Olesya Lyuzna (36:17.826)
Yeah.
Olesya Lyuzna (36:36.376)
Mm-hmm.
Olesya Lyuzna (36:42.744)
Huh. But like same realm, definitely. Yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (36:45.501)
Yeah, yeah. But yeah, poor poor Tyrone Power, who got absolutely nothing for this, and poor Marlene Dietrich, who, you know, just acts her pants off on this and just playing so many different characters. And you know, it reminds me of the movie that we just talked about, which is Glass Onion, which is like you have Janelle Monet, who is the linchpin of this entire thing, and she’s playing, you know.
Olesya Lyuzna (36:51.309)
Mm-hmm.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (37:11.421)
The sister, and then she’s playing the deceased sister, and she then she’s playing, you know, the sister playing the deceased sister. And you have that sort of multiple levels of who she’s pretending to be on screen. And I feel like Merlena Dietrich is you know, this character is somewhat the originator of that, where she’s like, I’m playing the dutiful wife, I’m playing the
Olesya Lyuzna (37:33.326)
Mm-hmm.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (37:34.257)
Ice cold queen bitch who will lie on the stand, you know, and force tears into my eyes. Or I’m playing someone who actually loves the character that she’s supposedly married to. Like at the end, when he gets acquitted and he comes back into the courtroom and they’re both in the courtroom at the same time. And she’s like, thank God. Like I will do my time for perjury because everybody knows I lied. But then we can run off together and be together. And she’s
Olesya Lyuzna (37:36.417)
Mm-hmm.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (38:02.452)
The r she is so emphatically in love with him. And it’s a really heartbreaking scene after everything that she’s already been through.
Olesya Lyuzna (38:11.906)
Yeah, yeah. No, I think especially when she kind of runs to him and hugs him and then you can kind of tell by his expression, does not return the hug, is just staring straight ahead. And the switch is crazy. Cause like while he’s on the stand and while she’s giving testimony, he’s like, no, my wife, my wife, why hasn’t she been here to, you know, visit me, whatever? But the switch is so immediate for both of them. so yeah, it is really interesting that neither Power nor Dietrich got any nominations. Cause I will say, like, I love
Emily Edwards (she/her) (38:28.67)
Yeah.
Olesya Lyuzna (38:41.528)
Charles Laughton’s performance, but I do feel like it’s a bit more like it’s more consistent throughout. And he doesn’t have these, you know, grand reversals or changes. He is playing one character, like an interesting one, but still I feel like the other two performances were probably more complex.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (38:45.865)
Yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (38:57.396)
Yeah. And he also has all of he and Elsa Lanchester have all of the really broad comedy elements, which is like, you know, there’s a point where he’s doing something and then they take out a pair of like Bermuda shorts, you know, please huge like plaid shorts to to fit his his fat body. And he’s just like, I can’t believe you’re bringing this out in court. And you know, and it’s it’s played for just the broadest possible laughs.
Olesya Lyuzna (39:04.141)
Yeah.
Olesya Lyuzna (39:10.912)
Yeah.
Olesya Lyuzna (39:23.533)
Mm.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (39:24.018)
And those, you know, and Elsa Lanchester as Miss Plimsoul, where she’s just harping on him constantly. They’re both really, really slapsticky almost characters, like ninety percent of their their presentation on screen, which we don’t think of of getting, you know, awards from the Academy. The Academy hates comedy, like through and through.
Olesya Lyuzna (39:35.374)
Mm-hmm.
Olesya Lyuzna (39:46.263)
Yeah. Hmm. Yeah, it makes you wonder. I kind of it makes me wanna go back and see if you know, different types of actors were more likely to get nominated or, you know, was there more of an appetite for comedy? Similar to like the way our appetite for genre has changed and like no one’s really making like westerns anymore, for example. kind of makes you wonder.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (40:03.697)
Yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (40:09.384)
Yeah. Like especially in the last couple years of like the Oscars, where people are like, see, horror is good, you know, is good cinema. And you’re just like, Yeah, it’s always kind of been there, but like you’re right that they are s giving horror and things like that. I still think we should possibly give murder mysteries slightly more attention, considering the they were so huge in the 1930s. You know, you think of like Fin Man era where, you know, William Powell
Olesya Lyuzna (40:17.815)
Yeah, yeah.
Olesya Lyuzna (40:21.366)
Mm.
Olesya Lyuzna (40:29.859)
Right.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (40:38.976)
Played a detective something like 50 some odd times on screen between Philo Vance and the Thin Man and like all these other ones where he’s playing like one-off detectives. That man played a detective for like 25 years. And then what’s really odd is that detective fiction and mystery fiction actually really fell off the screen in the 1950s. And so something like this is, you know, obviously it’s Agatha and she’s already like a best-selling author by this point. But I wonder, like,
Olesya Lyuzna (40:50.254)
Mm-hmm.
Olesya Lyuzna (41:05.036)
Mm.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (41:08.948)
Do you w like why do you think like this had s like was such a hit in the nineteen fifties, like especially like post war, where you’re trying to actually throw sympathy on an East German woman?
Olesya Lyuzna (41:21.832)
Yeah, it is it is interestingly complex. Like I do think it it does feel very of the time in the whole, you know, sort of anti-foreigner sentiment. But it’s also, I feel like Billy Wilder is very clever about it, where he is able to like illustrate maybe the attitudes of the time, but also it’s very kind of like
Not like tongue in cheek, but like you can kind of tell that he doesn’t necessarily believe it, or they’re kind of like different opinions. So like she, you know, gets all this criticism, everyone kind of hates her. She is very much like the villain, I would say, for most of the movie. But then by the end of it, you feel so much sympathy for her. And I feel like, you know, there’s a bit of the same thing, but in reverse happens for Leonard Vole. So
Emily Edwards (she/her) (41:55.445)
Mm-hmm.
Olesya Lyuzna (42:05.09)
I think what was compelling about this movie, and I don’t know if that’s just a 50s thing or just across the board, is it’s very psychological. And I think it focuses, like, yes, the mystery is there loud and clear, but it’s very focused on how people lie to each other, how people in relationships lie to each other, how they lie to themselves. So it’s very psychological, and I think that was probably compelling to audiences where it’s like big reversal, you know, post-war, we come back, you know, things have changed, we see the world differently, and this kind of
place to maybe some anxieties. I don’t know if there’s an element about like women’s role roles post war, if that’s a bit of a yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (42:40.884)
Yeah. There’s so much going on here. And I at first thought that maybe it was produced in Britain where they didn’t they weren’t as held to the Hayes Code as obviously Americans were. But it’s a United Artist picture and it was filmed in the United States, which I think like I’m actually really surprised by that because I feel like there are a lot of things in this that break the code where, you know.
Olesya Lyuzna (42:50.391)
Yeah.
Yeah.
Olesya Lyuzna (43:02.166)
Hmm.
Olesya Lyuzna (43:07.65)
Mm-hmm.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (43:08.734)
They’re not married and they’re pretending to be married, but they’re clearly in a sexual relationship. You know, it’s like you’ve been living as his wife, and we all know what that means, which, you know, they’re having sex outside of marriage. They are making a mockery of the court because she is openly perjuring herself. And we all know there’s no dramatic irony happening. Like she is openly perjuring herself and proud to do it. You know, she even says when she first meets the barrister, you know, like
Olesya Lyuzna (43:28.142)
Mm-hmm.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (43:34.855)
I will say this with tears in my eyes, and everybody will believe me. And you’re just like, my God, she’s admitting to crimes, like and happily admitting that she’s going to do them. And you know, the cops look silly, which is a huge thing. You know, it’s you the they’re they’re presenting evidence from this deaf little old lady.
Olesya Lyuzna (43:37.228)
Hmm. Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (43:55.913)
And, you know, under even the most basic of, you know, my cousin Vinny’s scrutiny, you know, we find out that she doesn’t have a hearing aid, she can’t hear anything. She’s she’s demanding that everything she’s saying is true, but we prove that it can’t possibly be because she can’t hear. you know, we have all this stuff that really goes against code. And then, surprise, surprise, at the end of the movie, Marlene Dietrich’s character
Dabs the man that she’s supposedly married to and is in love with. And sh and Charles Laughton’s character is like, I’m gonna get you off the hook because this man’s a piece of shit. And you’re just like, hell yeah, Charles Laughton.
Olesya Lyuzna (44:31.303)
Ha ha ha.
Olesya Lyuzna (44:38.85)
That was very cathartic. I mean, I feel like for all the drama that we got by the end of it, it it felt very uplifting to me personally.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (44:46.004)
Right? Like, like this man is dead and bleeding on the f carpeted floor of this courtroom. His new Hatsita girlfriend is sobbing her eyes out. And then the barrister who is like, I am the greatest defense lawyer that’s ever lived. He’s just like, yeah, that fucker deserved it. Like, you’re just so happy that everybody is on her side at the end of this.
Olesya Lyuzna (44:49.763)
Yeah.
Olesya Lyuzna (45:07.81)
Thank you.
Olesya Lyuzna (45:15.776)
No, it that’s that’s truly wild. I do wonder actually, because I was reading about differences between I’m not sure about the play versus the movie, but the store short story in the movie. And I read that Leonard Voles death slash stabbing was added to the movie. So that I think in the story he walks free. And I feel like as you were talking about the code, I wonder, because it’s very like bad guy must get punished. So like
Emily Edwards (she/her) (45:26.666)
Mm.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (45:33.523)
Olesya Lyuzna (45:41.3)
Maybe that’s sort of the nod to the code where it’s like, he did a bad thing, so he gets punished. But then it still leaves us with the story of, you know, like Marlene and her very morally grey actions and she’s kind of painted as the the good guy by the end of it. So yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (45:58.162)
Yeah. I I wonder if she gets a pass because, you know, her whole thing is like, I have to marry this Americ or this man who’s not, you know, he has to take her somewhere else because she’s really desperate.
Olesya Lyuzna (46:07.266)
Mm.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (46:12.629)
To leave East Germany. And so in the 1950s, obviously Cold War is a cold in. And we like, she’s like, I have to escape. Like, you know, like Russian occupied East Germany. So, like, maybe she gets a pass for all of her desperate stuff because it’s like a Cold War kind of thing, which, you know, again, doesn’t often factor into how we think about the politics of movies now because we’re so far out of it, or you know, like.
Olesya Lyuzna (46:14.383)
Mm-hmm.
Olesya Lyuzna (46:23.118)
Mm.
Olesya Lyuzna (46:31.031)
Hmm.
Olesya Lyuzna (46:40.479)
Emily Edwards (she/her) (46:41.543)
And you know, it ended in the 90s. So we have like, you know, a different understanding of the Cold War. And, you know, people even forget that Germany was divided. You know, it the the wall came down when I was a little kid. So like, you know, people even forget that there were two Germanys at a certain point. And, you know, East Germany was the one you really didn’t want to live in. So she she was like, I have to get out. So that I, you know, and she gets this like kind of like pass for desperation, I guess. Maybe.
Olesya Lyuzna (46:44.195)
Yeah.
Olesya Lyuzna (46:56.503)
Right here.
Olesya Lyuzna (47:07.663)
Mm-hmm. Yeah, I think it’s possible. And then I think by the end of it too, it is revealed that she like did love him, did it all for love. So in a way, it is very much like a, you know, wife does good kind of movie, like when when all is revealed. and so maybe that sort of saves her in a way. Cause like one thing that sort of not confused me but interested me was Charles Laughton’s character and his sort of views on like morality, I guess, or like he
Emily Edwards (she/her) (47:20.117)
Mm-hmm.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (47:35.744)
Mm-hmm.
Olesya Lyuzna (47:37.112)
He had his like monocle test where he’d put on his monocle, which I I thought was such a fun kind of idea. And then he had the, you know, the reflected light from the monocle would he’d use that as like a lie detector test. And he did it on Vol, and he did it on his wife. But he only chose to represent him because he was positive that Vol was innocent. And that was kind of his whole shtick. And, you know, he has this reputation for winning unwinnable cases, but it’s cause he like truly believes it.
And so I wonder if that, well, I don’t know, if he was just in a state of shock by the end of it, where he’s like, my gosh, I believed in Vol, but he was wrong. And then the force of his sort of dismay makes him take this other approach to his wife. Like, yeah, okay, fuck that guy, you know, that kind of thing. Or back to that. But yeah, I found that really interesting too, because for all his cynicism and, you know, his barbs at the beginning, he’s very like, maybe that’s Agatha Christie’s moralizing sort of little.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (48:18.421)
Yeah. Exactly.
Olesya Lyuzna (48:33.7)
Freak.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (48:33.747)
Yeah, yeah. No, it’s funny because like when when you were like, I’m on a Billy Wilder kick, and I was Yeah, I love Billy Wilder movies. I really do. But my brain always goes like to all of his screwballs. And because that’s what Billy Wilder is really known for me. And then earlier at the top of the hour, you mentioned you were like, and double nim indemnity, and I’m super into his noirs. And I was like, Right, he’s one of the greatest noir directors of all time. He’s absolutely phenomenal. And I actually
Olesya Lyuzna (48:47.085)
Yeah. Mm.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (49:03.125)
Kept waiting for this movie to pick a side between screwball and noir. And I was thinking that actually, like, what’s funny about this is that it’s a screwball on either end with a noir kind of shoved into the middle. And I was like, who is the screwball couple in this? Because you know, there’s always a comedy.
Olesya Lyuzna (49:08.023)
Mm.
Yeah.
Olesya Lyuzna (49:22.116)
Yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (49:28.435)
Of marriage or a comedy of remarriage in a screwball. And then I realized it’s Charles Laughton and Elsa Lanchester because he’s so adamant about ditching his nurse in the first 15 minutes of the movie. And then by the end, she comes around and is like, No, I’m going to help you and commit to being in your life.
Olesya Lyuzna (49:36.631)
Ha ha ha
Emily Edwards (she/her) (49:56.186)
As like the barr the nurse to the barrister. And even though it’s not implied that they’re like a romantic couple, I was like, my God, the comedy of marriage of a screwball ends up with the barrister and the nurse becoming a team together. And I was like, Of course, Billy Wilder has that in there, because he’s the greatest screwball correct like director freaking ever.
Olesya Lyuzna (49:59.118)
Yeah.
Olesya Lyuzna (50:12.099)
Yeah.
Olesya Lyuzna (50:19.277)
Yeah. my gosh. No, it’s so funny you say that because you’re you’re right. It’s a it’s a screwball comedy with like a surprise noir center, and we could be here just talking about, you know, Charles and Elsa’s sort of repartee. and we could totally kind of skip out on the other stuff. Or we could just focus on the the main storyline. So it’s all so layered and also the when you mentioned the ending, I could almost see like a sequel, you know? I feel like it was almost set up for that.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (50:45.557)
Yes. I’m glad they didn’t because like I love just the image of her of Marlene Dietrich’s character, just kind of like being led out in handcuffs with like that that again, like platinum blonde sort of like head held high. And she was so tall. She was like five nine, five ten, and she’s the same height as all the cops who are like leading her away. It’s just such an a gorgeous image.
Olesya Lyuzna (50:55.631)
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
Olesya Lyuzna (51:15.394)
Mm.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (51:15.435)
For her character to kind of be led on, and for everyone involved to be so resolute in helping her. No one wants to throw her to the wolves, which is a really, again, interesting sort of image and concept to leave on. Where, again, it seems somewhat antithetical to the fact that, like, we make fun of Agatha Christie all the time because like she is really very like.
Olesya Lyuzna (51:38.137)
Mm-hmm.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (51:44.37)
s’prim and proper and she’s so moralizing. Like she’s so happy to be like that person is evil and should be just sent away to jail forever. There’s really no equivocation in a lot of her books and a lot of her texts for like gray area. And I feel like this is the grayest I’ve ever seen Agatha Christie like text being, you know, represented.
Olesya Lyuzna (52:01.571)
El b
Olesya Lyuzna (52:08.479)
Yeah, yeah, I agree. I think that’s what makes it really kind of unusual. at the same time though, I did read that Agatha Christie called this like one of the best like movies based on her work, which I thought was major praise. and I wonder, I I just I love the image of her watching the film and like what she thought of it. Yeah. I feel like that’s so good.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (52:17.974)
Right?
Emily Edwards (she/her) (52:28.853)
Yeah, I know. Like, could you imagine? She’s just like, Aren’t I a genius? Like, just eating popcorn. She’s like, I’m so good at this. Like
I’m glad you brought it up earlier because normally I like to ask, like, could you like who would you cast in like a remake? And I I I don’t know, like Marlene Dietrich’s character is definitely like the hardest person to think of of like who to put in that place. Do you have any idea of like who is who could do the Tyrone Power kind of role?
Olesya Lyuzna (52:45.367)
Yeah.
Olesya Lyuzna (53:00.527)
For some reason I was thinking like Zach Efron. Like well, ’cause I’m thinking like pretty boy, but like older now, you know, maybe maybe one of the like Disney kids grown up. Yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (53:02.953)
Yeah Yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (53:12.659)
totally. Yeah. I like that. Yeah. I I love the Charles Laughton character so much. Like, I don’t know if I could think of a sort of British actor to do it because I’m really just not as familiar with like older, maybe like sixties or seven year old British actors. But I could see someone like Jeff Bridges pulling it off really well.
Olesya Lyuzna (53:16.226)
Hmm.
Olesya Lyuzna (53:29.059)
Yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (53:37.373)
Even though he’s, you know, the dude.
Olesya Lyuzna (53:39.843)
Yeah. that’s so funny.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (53:44.204)
Where he’s just kind of like very like put upon, like he’s such an old man now. And like he just has that calmness about him, which I think is really interesting. That would blend it. Like the last thing he really did where he got tons of praise was the Western Heller High Water, which I thought he was really, really good in. But, you know, he just has that incredible sort of
Olesya Lyuzna (53:48.707)
Yeah.
Mm.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (54:07.103)
like centeredness to him or like that self-assurance that I feel like would go really well for like, I know who I am and I am the defense lawyer that gets everybody off. And I and you know, and it’s such an interesting like Perry Mason was like, I only defend the people I know are innocent. And it’s like every time you read or watch a Perry Mason, you’re like, is this the time where he finally defends someone who’s obviously guilty?
Olesya Lyuzna (54:09.326)
Yes.
Olesya Lyuzna (54:15.009)
And then
Olesya Lyuzna (54:31.459)
Yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (54:33.267)
And of course that never happens because we’re allowed to have that fantasy. But like I love the fact that he gets that sort of like shake to his core that he’s defending someone who is so freaking guilty.
Olesya Lyuzna (54:41.743)
Mm-hmm.
Olesya Lyuzna (54:45.333)
Yeah, yeah. my gosh. That was that was really delicious, I think, at the end. I mean, yeah. Ugh, this movie. yeah, the one thing that I also wanted to talk about was the the two women. Well, I guess there were more than two, three, but thinking about Dietrich versus the the actress who played Mrs. French, the rich lady who gets killed, Norma Varden.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (54:50.644)
Yeah.
Yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (55:08.188)
Yeah.
Olesya Lyuzna (55:10.179)
What I found really interesting was so like the typecasting is so different where Dietrich is, you know, the femme fatale and we’ve already sung her praises. So like such an icon. But then with Mrs. Emily Friend, she is, you know, she’s this lonely older lady. She’s very much like those are sort of the adjectives that are used to describe her. But I was surprised to learn the ages of the actors who played the roles, that apparently like Power was in his like mid to like
Early to mid 40s when he filmed this. I think it was actually his last role because spooky, he died of a heart attack after. that was kind of sad. But Dietrich was like 56, I wanna say. Yeah. And then what’s her name? Mrs. French, the actress who played her, is 59. So isn’t that interesting?
Emily Edwards (she/her) (55:45.295)
yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (55:53.237)
Damn, she looked good.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (56:02.848)
Wow. Yeah.
Olesya Lyuzna (56:03.596)
I feel like there are probably like many other examples in Hollywood where you kind of have the the typecast. and you know, this is sort of although I do think there is one side comment where it’s like, you married him to get out of East Germany, you were older. Like I think we get that a little bit, but it’s so hard to tell ’cause she looks so good.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (56:16.588)
Yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (56:20.254)
Yeah. I was gonna say, like it, you know, you see those memes all the time where you like they show photos of people like kids, you know, in the eighties and you know they’re like, These are high schoolers, and it’s like they look ancient. And you’re just kind of like, Yeah, we don’t smoke anymore. So like our skin looks a lot better and we don’t look like we’re 45 or like the assistant manager of a bank when we’re, you know, in in high school. But Tyrone Power is kind of like he’s a rough early 40s, you know, he he’s got
Olesya Lyuzna (56:30.06)
Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
Olesya Lyuzna (56:41.25)
Yeah.
Olesya Lyuzna (56:47.598)
Yeah, yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (56:49.012)
He’s got age in his skin. Obviously, he’s lived through a war. I don’t know how much fighting he did, but you know, he’s he w lived through a war. And like, but Marlene, again, like she just has that in and I would not have guessed that she was actually a decade older than him in this movie. I really honestly thought that they were like of very comparable ages. and the fact and again at the end when his like new girlfriend is like, you’re years older than him, I was like,
Olesya Lyuzna (56:52.618)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Olesya Lyuzna (57:05.762)
Mm.
Olesya Lyuzna (57:17.39)
That is true. That is also like a plausible explanation, I think. Yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (57:18.056)
Is she really? Like or are you just being a snotty little twenty-two-year-old?
Emily Edwards (she/her) (57:29.462)
my gosh. the woman who plays his snotty little girlfriend is an actress named Ruda Lee, and she is still alive. She is 91 years old. Good for Ruda. Good for her. she was one of the brides in Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, apparently.
Olesya Lyuzna (57:39.436)
No way. my gosh. Has she been in anything since?
Olesya Lyuzna (57:50.855)
my gosh. I haven’t seen that movie yet, but I’ve heard so many things.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (57:54.275)
me neither. It’s one of those ones where you’re just like, Huh, what was Hollywood on back then? Like sometimes you watch those old musicals and you’re just like, What an interesting culture begat this. Like
Olesya Lyuzna (58:08.086)
Yes. Well, because you think there are multiple approvals, you know? Like this went through many people.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (58:13.386)
Yes. Yeah. Or like because it’s also in color, like the makeup is so interesting. And you know, thinking about this movie being in black and white when it did have the capability to be in color, that is such an interesting choice to make. And I feel like they were really going for that like sort of noir vibe where it’s like every
Olesya Lyuzna (58:36.69)
Emily Edwards (she/her) (58:37.994)
You you want it to be black and white. You want it to be he is guilty, he is not guilty, they are in love, they are not in love. And that’s such an interesting choice to make for a movie that was like it came out the same like 1957 movies. There were plenty of like modern feeling movies at that time. I wanna like kinda like look it up really quickly. Of course, Wikipedia does not make this easy.
Olesya Lyuzna (58:40.205)
Hmm.
Olesya Lyuzna (58:55.682)
Mm yeah.
Yeah.
Olesya Lyuzna (59:03.849)
Yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (59:05.844)
Just like, yeah, there there were other like really whatever, fuck it. I’m not like I’m gonna have to edit that part out. But yeah, there were more like modern feeling, you know, like song and dancey kind of like colorful movies. And then you have this, which is like hearkening back to you know, the Maltese Falcon, even though there’s no reason for that, it’s so interesting.
Olesya Lyuzna (59:11.671)
Ha ha ha.
Olesya Lyuzna (59:16.907)
Mm.
Olesya Lyuzna (59:23.406)
Mm-hmm. Yeah. It’s very like shadow and light too, I feel like from the monocle test to like all the shadows of him just kind of skulking the streets. it adds a lot of kind of drama. He that’s what he does. He’s a skulker.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (59:35.082)
He does skulk, doesn’t he?
He yeah, he skulks. Yeah, he you know, Tyrone Power is just like really interesting casting for this because again, you like you mentioned, like, of course I hit my mic, I talk too much with my hands. Like you mentioned earlier that like he was so well known for being just like this pretty boy, and he was just like, you know, like Montgomery Clift levels of like gorgeous, gorgeous young man. And then he’s so smarmy and so craggy in there. So it’s just so impressive.
Olesya Lyuzna (59:47.254)
Mm.
Ha ha ha.
Olesya Lyuzna (59:56.098)
Mm-hmm.
Olesya Lyuzna (01:00:03.682)
Yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (01:00:08.768)
Yeah, he was a handsome fella from Ohio. There was no way he was getting that that English accent right. That was not gonna happen. So I’m so glad they decided to keep him American in that. my gosh, like I don’t think I would have ever sat down and watched this movie if you hadn’t suggested it. But I just absolutely adored it. And I’m just so interested in like how it all came together and how Billy Wilder was like the perfect director for it.
Olesya Lyuzna (01:00:15.626)
I know. I know.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (01:00:38.398)
I I can’t thank you enough for suggesting it.
Olesya Lyuzna (01:00:38.86)
Yeah. my gosh, of course. Yeah, no, I I’m gonna continue on my Billy Wilder kick after this. I think I I probably still have about half of his filmography to watch, but I’m pacing myself very slowly.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (01:00:52.35)
What what’s your favorite movie that you’ve seen of his so far, if you can choose just one?
Olesya Lyuzna (01:00:56.31)
Ooh, probably the apartment actually. But it’s also like the one I rewatched most recently. because I mean I love Double Indemnity, I loved Sunset Boulevard, I like laughed at the major and the minor, which is just ridiculous concept, but very fun. But I feel like the apartment to me had the most kind of like complexity and felt very modern. so yeah, I didn’t think I would choose like a non mystery, but here we are. Yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (01:01:10.411)
Yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (01:01:23.296)
Yeah. Yeah. No. And talk about a guy who lived forever. Billy Wilder died in like two thousand two. Like he lived forever. So cool. Olesya, how can everybody keep in touch with you and your books and your work that’s coming out?
Olesya Lyuzna (01:01:29.154)
I know.
Olesya Lyuzna (01:01:34.392)
Crazy.
Olesya Lyuzna (01:01:39.276)
Yeah, well the best place is probably Instagram. I am Olesya is online. that is my handle. I’m also usually online so it checks out. Yeah.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (01:01:48.19)
Awesome. Well, thank you so much. Do you have and your c name your books again just so everybody has them fresh in their mind.
Olesya Lyuzna (01:01:53.854)
Yes. Yes. so Glitter in the Dark and my latest is Liars in Paradise. and you can start wherever, even though it’s a series. So if you want the full lore, start with Glitter.
Emily Edwards (she/her) (01:02:04.149)
Awesome.
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