"Suggested for Mature Audiences": MPAA Announcement by Julie Andrews (1967)
Channel: The Julie Andrews Archive
Date: 2021-01-20

It was the spring of 1967, and Julie Andrews was waiting for her cue. Though relatively new to Hollywood, Andrews had rocketed to fame in just three years thanks to the back-to-back successes of Mary Poppins (which earned her an Oscar) and The Sound of Music (which set a new record for the highest-grossing film of all time). That past summer, she had headlined Alfred Hitchcock’s latest thriller, Torn Curtain, making Andrews an old industry vet at the age of 31.

But this job was a little different.

“We’ve all seen these signs hundreds of times,” Andrews began, as images of a striped barber’s pole and a prescription symbol flashed past. “And we know automatically what they mean.”

“I’m here to introduce you to a brand new sign, one I hope you’ll grow to understand,” she continued. It was a brand new logo for the MPAA, the same one that rolls over the credits of movies today. The censors were still calling it a “seal” in 1967, even if it carried a much different meaning than the industry seals of the past, and they’d hired Andrews to unveil it. Her filmed spot would run as a trailer in theaters, teaching audiences how to assess new movies.

There was another symbol key to that education, one that Andrews covered in the teaser.

“Occasionally, not often, you will see pictures wearing this sign,” she said, turning towards a blue posterboard stamped with yellow text. It read, “Suggested for Mature Audiences.” As Andrews explained, “They will be pictures dealing with adult themes and the sign is for the information of parents, so they’ll know they must decide for themselves whether they want their children to see these particular films.”


In the spring of 1967, the SMA tag was still rare — only nine films, by Variety’s count, had carried it. But the number of “mature” films would rise as the year wore on, leading the MPAA to the inevitable conclusion: it was time for a true system of film classification, and an end to the Production Code.


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From: Hollywood Codebreakers: ‘Mature’ Films Retire the Code
by Kristin Hunt, Dec 3, 2018

source: https://medium.com/@kristinhunt/hollywood-codebreakers-mature-films-retire-the-code-a4938288ee65