Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1958) on Netflix
Brick Pollitt drinks his days away and rejects his wife Maggie's affection. At the family plantation for his father Big Daddy's sixty-fifth birthday, the talk is of inheritance.
- Netflix4.0/5
- IMDb7.9/1057,585 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes97%
Trailer
Plot summary
Maggie Pollitt cannot get near her husband, Brick, a former high school football star who spends his days drinking at the family's cotton plantation in Mississippi. Everyone has gathered there for the sixty-fifth birthday of Brick's father, Big Daddy. Brick's older brother Gooper and Gooper's wife Mae, parents of five children with a sixth on the way, work to stay in the old man's favor, and the family whispers that Big Daddy is ill and will have to settle his estate. Brick broke his ankle in a drunken fall and stays in his room on crutches, drinking, rather than join the celebration.
Cast
- Zelda Cleaveras Sookey (uncredited)
- Hugh Corcoranas Buster (uncredited)
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1958)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- Filming was interrupted when Elizabeth Taylor's husband, producer Mike Todd, was killed in a plane crash on March 21, 1958; Taylor had canceled her plans to fly with him. She remained off the set until April 14, returning much thinner and weaker.
- MGM head Dore Schary bought the film rights intending the film to star Grace Kelly, be directed by Joshua Logan and be produced by Sol Siegel. Siegel did not want to produce it, Kelly retired from acting to marry Rainier III, Prince of Monaco, and Logan lost interest.
- George Cukor was the original director but left the project after disagreements over the script, particularly how the gay themes would be addressed; Joseph L. Mankiewicz was considered before Richard Brooks took over.
- Ben Gazzara, who played Brick Pollitt on stage, rejected the film role. Athlete-turned-actor Floyd Simmons tested for it, producer Pandro Berman considered William Shatner as Brick, and Lana Turner was considered for Maggie before the part went to Elizabeth Taylor.
- Richard Brooks said he cast Paul Newman as Brick because he could keep the camera on him for minutes while he thought, adding that Newman "was not a big star then."
- Brooks shot much of the film on one set with a bedroom floor, a ground floor and a basement, saying he was determined not to break through and smash Williams's play and had to move because of the vast amount of dialogue.
