Alex da Silva says waitress Shelley Winters (Pat) in the funniest line from the film. She's a waitress that has a dalliance with esteemed stage actor Ronald Colman (Anthony). She looks slim in this film but as soon as you recognize her, it's pretty obvious about her fate. The film is about weirdo Colman losing his identity in the roles that he plays and so, of course, his next role is Othello where he gets to murder Desdemona every night. This is pretty obvious stuff.The idea is fine but everything about the film can be anticipated, especially as it is told at such a snail's pace. Boring? Yep. Especially as they throw in huge segments of the actual Shakespearean performance of Othello. I didn't buy a film about the play but this is what you end up watching. You get huge irrelevant sections of the very boring play. The best version of the Othello death scene is done by the cast of Cheers. As this film seems to contain so much footage of the Othello performance, it is aptly relevant to review the Cheers performance as a comparison. Cheers does it way better! There are some nice techniques employed in the film to convey Colman's madness but the story doesn't make any sense at all – from the initial idea of the actor going mad and losing his identity in his role, to the ludicrous relationship he has with ex-wife and fellow actress Signe Hasso (Brita), to the insultingly daft investigation into the killer being caught. The film, unfortunately, just drags even in spite of Whit Bissell turning up in a small role. I recommend you watch the Cheers episode instead of this for a much more realistic and funnier tale of a man being consumed by jealousy and acting out the Othello thing.

l_rawjalaurence A DOUBLE LIFE proved beyond doubt the quality of Ronald Colman as a screen actor. As Anthony John, the Broadway star whose characterization of Othello eventually consumes him, he turns in a powerful performance, highlighted by George Cukor's sensitive direction. He begins the film in his familiar urbane manner, but as the strain of portraying such a role gets the better of him, so he begins to become more hysterical in the delivery of his lines. Through an intelligent use of voice-over, that compliments the actor's increasingly disheveled appearance, director Cukor shows art and life become totally confused in his mind, as he consciously mistakes the young server Pat Kroll (Shelley Winters) for Desdemona, with tragic consequences. A DOUBLE LIFE is a visual feast, intelligently photographed by Milton Krasner; the repeated shot of the theater curtain rising and falling - often in shadow - reminds us of how much the stage dominates Anthony's life, as well as signaling the film's denouement. In a series of two-shots, the shadows keep falling across the faces of the women in Anthony's life - his ex-wife (and costar in the Othello production)) Brita (Signe Hasso), Pat Kroll - suggesting that their lives are somehow fated through association with the star. Designer Harry Horner's sets are lush yet threatening, the heavy furniture pressing in upon Anthony as he tries to make sense of an increasingly disordered life; there are several close-ups of his face shot against the shadows of the banisters, suggesting imprisonment. In a strategy that foreshadows a similar technique in THE HEIRESS (1949), also designed by Horner, Anthony is shown climbing stairs, suggesting that he has mental as well as physical levels to contend with. The fact that he fails in this task draws further attention to his disordered state of mind. The actual performance of "Othello" is somewhat stagy, with the actors standing and declaiming their lines in a conscious evocation of late nineteenth century styles of production. However this technique gives Cukor the opportunity to focus on the actors in close- up, especially Colman and Hasso, as Hasso realizes (to her horror) that her death-scene as Desdemona might be taking place for real. A DOUBLE LIFE is a powerful film, showing the lengths to which actors can go to give a truthful performance, and how it can affect their mental state.

blanche-2 Ronald Colman is actor Anthony John, who finds himself leading "A Double Life" in this 1947 film directed by George Cukor and written by Ruth Gordon and Garson Kanin.There are mutterings in the beginning of the film about some problem with "Tony" (Colman) the last time he took on a serious role, such a bad problem that his wife, fellow actress Brita (Signe Hasso), could no longer stay with him. When Tony is finally convinced to do the title role in "Othello," we begin to see what the problem is. He disappears into his role and acts it out offstage as well as on -- and pretty soon, his onstage performances become pretty terrifying.The elegant Colman is terrific as Anthony, particularly the offstage Anthony, who believes he's Othello and searches for a Desdemona to murder. His actual Othello is good but slightly old-fashioned. The trend today is more naturalistic. Nevertheless, for the times, he had the speaking voice and the style.Shelley Winters has an early role as a victim - she's very young and pretty.Recommended -- see it for Colman's Oscar-winning performance.

MARIO GAUCI A fondly-remembered melodrama – thanks chiefly to Ronald Colman's fine Oscar-winning central performance – about an oft-treated theme: the nature of acting and how it can overtake one's perception of reality. In this case, we have a well-known thespian tackling Shakespeare's "Othello", so that the film's last third delves effectively into the thriller genre – with press agent Edmond O'Brien (who happens to really be besotted with Colman's co-star and ex-wife Signe Hasso) 'investigating' the actor's possible involvement in the Desdemona-like strangling of a celebrity-seeking waitress (a very slim Shelley Winters). The theatrical/New York atmosphere of the immediate post-war era is vividly captured by the husband-and-wife screen writing team of Garson Kanin and Ruth Gordon and legendary "actor's director" George Cukor (all of whom were recognized by the Academy with nominations); incidentally, the film nabbed a second Oscar for Miklos Rozsa's eclectic score. Colman, forever the suave leading man blessed besides with a velvety voice, does well enough by Shakespeare – gaining conviction the farther his character slips into obsessive jealousy, a murderous rage and, eventually, paranoia; however, he is not let down by a supporting cast which also includes director Ray Collins, reporter Millard Mitchell, detective Joe Sawyer and coroner Whit Bissell. Though the mid-section is a bit strained, the film makes up for any deficiencies with a remarkably-handled Expressionist denouement.