Posted: Sat., Dec. 31, 1949, 11:00pm PT

Champagne for Caesar

By Variety Staff

United Artists. Director Richard Whorf; Producer George Moskov; Screenplay Hans Jacoby, Fred Brady; Camera Paul Ivano; Editor Hugh Bennett; Music Dimitri Tiomkin

Ronald Colman Celeste Holm Vincent Price Barbara Britton Art Linkletter

Champagne for Caesar centers its lampooning on bigtime soap companies and the quiz shows that hand out money freely to contestants. Ronald Colman plays an intellectual, a sort of walking encyclopedia, who sets out to smash such radio gimmicks and the people who sponsor them.

He gets on Art Linkletter's question-and-answer program after figuring out that show's sponsor is worth about $40 million. Since for each answer the prize is doubled, Colman figures to run it up to the sponsor's value, take over and wipe out the alleged threat to American intellect.

Various styles of comedy range from the quiet statement of the Colman character to the broadly burlesqued soap tycoon portrait drawn by Vincent Price.

(B&W) Available on VHS, DVD. Extract of a review from 1950. Running time: 99 MIN.