MOVIE · 1942
To Be or Not to Be
ComedyRomanceWar99 min
In Nazi-occupied Warsaw, a theater company finds its stagecraft pressed into service when a Polish officer’s hunt for a German spy pulls them into the resistance. Carole Lombard is Maria Tura, one half of a married acting pair whose offstage life is as tangled as the production they’re rehearsing. Opposite her, Jack Benny’s Joseph Tura carries himself like a grand tragedian until disguises, impersonations, and split-second timing become matters beyond the footlights. Ernst Lubitsch folds backstage rivalry, infidelity, and espionage into a wartime farce built around actors using performance as cover.
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