Harold Prince | Something for Everyone / 1970

redeeming families: member of the family

by Douglas Messerli

 

Hugh Wheeler (screenplay, based on the novel by Harry Kressing), Harold Prince (director) Something for Everyone / 1970

 

Harold Prince’s Something for Everyone of 1970 begins with a handsome stranger’s visit to a family, this family ensconced in a grand estate, even though the Countess Herthe von Ornstein has little money left. The visitor, Konrad (Michael York during his pretty boy period), seems, at first, just to want to work for the family, quickly dispensing a previous servant by revealing to the police that his room his filled with Nazi memorabilia.

     Konrad also has sex with nearly everyone, first with the son, Helmuth (Anthony Higgins), and then with the elderly Countess. But Konrad, rather than being an angelic visitor as in Pasolini’s Teorema is most definitely a demonic one, plotting, with the family’s tacit agreement, a marriage between Helmuth and a gauche, but wealthy American family’s daughter, for whom they are willing to pay a handsome dowry.

          Since Helmuth, a devoted homosexual, has no interest in women, Konrad himself secretly woos the daughter, Anneliese, finally convincing her that by accepting marriage with Helmuth they might remain together. The deal is struck, and the wedding celebrated; but at the last moment, the daughter, going to his room to celebrate, discovers Konrad and Helmuth in the midst of sex.

          Speechless, she seethes in the back seat of the car that Conrad drives to return her parents to the train station. When she finally begins to reveal with the “horror” she has witnessed, Konrad sends the car over the cliff, himself escaping, killing the Pleschke’s and keeping his and the family’s secrets.

         With money, the family is now free to return to the status quo, but Konrad determines to marry the Countess, making himself heir to their fortune, again assuring Helmuth that this way he can remain close and continue their sexual relationship.

         All this time, the rather plain looking daughter of the Countess, Lotte (Jane Carr) has been watching and waiting, and now threatens Konrad that if he does not marry her, she will tell all. We never know whether she will insist that Konrad, in the future, pay attention to her alone, or whether this plotting and scheming family might all share in Konrad’s love. Nonetheless, Konrad now is most definitely a member of the family.

       

Los Angeles, June 8, 2016

Reprinted from World Cinema Review (June 2016).