User Reviews

Three years after this episode of "Four Star Playhouse" a very similar but much darker film came out with the same sort of plot. In "Marjorie Morningstar", a young lady insists that a guy who plays the piano at a cheap camp was too much of an artist for such mundane work and she got him to take a leap of faith and try his hand at Broadway. In this episode, an equally wide-eyed and overly optimistic young lady, Germaine (Gloria Talbott) insists that a commercial artist, Charles (David Niven) is just too good for that sort of thing and should be a serious artist. The main difference between the film and this episode is that the film had a much more morose quality about it and this show is played mostly for laughs. Additionally, Charles has a wife (Barbara Billingsly) and she tries to keep him more or less grounded despite dippy Germaine's insistence he should be something more than he already is.

This is a pleasant but otherwise unremarkable episode. Good...but not much more and the actors mostly give it there best. As for Talbott, I thought her character was too broadly written and a bit tough to believe at times.

Charles (David Niven) is an artist who studied in Paris. Instead of painting art for art's sake. He turned his back on creative endeavours.

Charles is in his 30s and painting for commercial contracts. Advertising and promotions, it pays the bills.

When he meets young model Germaine (Gloria Talbott) who is only 20 years old and new. Charles seems to have a mid life crisis.

Germaine remarks that Charles would not have settled for a life of making art for purely money. Feeling jaded. Charles goes for high art much to his wife's annoyance.

Any introspective quality is secondary to light comedy which plays to Niven's strengths.

At least Charles realises that he was not alone in making art for commercial gain. The great masters also did the same. While Germaine had no idea what it is like to starve.