Royal Wedding (1951)

Royal Wedding is a 1951 American musical comedy film directed by Stanley Donen, and starring Fred Astaire and Jane Powell, with music by Burton Lane and lyrics by Alan Jay Lerner. Set in 1947 London at the time of the wedding of Princess Elizabeth and Philip Mountbatten, the film follows an American brother-sister song and dance duo who, while performing, each fall in love — he, with a female dancer, and she, with an impoverished but well-connected nobleman. The film marked Donen's second directorial feature. It was released as Wedding Bells in the United Kingdom.
 
Royal Wedding is one of several MGM musicals that entered the public domain because the studio failed to renew the copyright registration in the 28th year after its publication.
==Plot==
The story sees brother and sister Tom and Ellen Bowen as stars of a show Every Night at Seven, a Broadway success. They are persuaded to take the show to London, capitalizing on the imminent royal wedding of Princess Elizabeth and Philip Mountbatten.
On the ship, Ellen meets and quickly falls in love with the impoverished but well-connected Lord John Brindale. Whilst casting the show in London, Tom falls in love with a newly engaged dancer, Anne Ashmond. Tom assists Anne in reconciling her estranged parents and also asks his agent to locate Anne's supposed fiancé in Chicago – only to discover that he's married and therefore Anne is free to do what she likes.
Carried away by the emotion of the wedding, the two couples decide that they will also be married that day. Thanks to the resourcefulness of Tom's London agent, Edgar Klinger, who knows someone in the Archbishop's office who can cut through the official red tape and also has a cooperative minister in his pocket, Anne and Tom, and Ellen and John, are in fact married on the royal wedding day.
==Cast==
* Fred Astaire as Tom Bowen
* Jane Powell as Ellen Bowen
* Peter Lawford as Lord John Brindale
* Sarah Churchill as Anne Ashmond
* Keenan Wynn as Irving Klinger / Edgar Klinger
* Albert Sharpe as James Ashmond
==References==
Category:1951 films
Category:English-language films
Category:1950s musical comedy films
Category:1950s romantic comedy films
Category:American films
Category:American musical comedy films
Category:American romantic comedy films
Category:Films
Category:1950s films
Category:American romantic musical films
Category:Films directed by Stanley Donen
Category:Films about weddings
Category:Films produced by Arthur Freed
Category:Films set in 1947
Category:Films set in London
Category:Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer films