AUNTIE MAME (1958), Rosalind Russell, abt how Patrick came to attend St. Boniface Boarding School

The description offered via IMDB is a two-sentence collapse of the story: "An orphan goes to live with his free-spirited aunt. Conflict ensues when the executor of [the orphan's] father's estate objects to the aunt's lifestyle."

In these scenes excerpted from the beginning of the movie, the 9 year-old orphan, Patrick Dennis, has been living with his free-spirited Auntie Mame for a short while. Set October 1929 in Mame's Manhattan Beekman Place apartment, these scenes explain how young Patrick is sent off to St Boniface Boarding School by the Trustee of his money, Dwight Babcock, President of the conservative Knickerbocker Bank.

Note: After he greets Mr Babcock, Patrick informs Babcock that "My auntie Mame will be right down. She's having a little trouble with her halo." The "halo" is a reference to the previous scene: Set in Mame's bedroom, Mame has awoke hung-over, with the stage actress Vera Charles predictably passed-out in the guest room, next door. Mame receives a phone call from Babcock, informing her that he is in her neighborhood and would like to see her right then and there. Mame has admitted she's been avoiding Babcock, "for weeks." Desperate, she awakes Vera and insist she arise and help her dress. Vera advises her, "Do the Lillian Gish routine. You know: simple dress; Madonna-like hairdo."

The hair switch is part of Mame and Vera's effort to make the bohemian Mame look conservatively acceptable to Patrick's Trustee, Dwight Babcock, who is in control of Patrick's money. Initially, Mame's charms seem to win Babcock over. But in the final scene, it's all to no use, as Babcock departs, declaring to Mame, "I'm going to turn this kid into a decent, God-fearing Christian if I have to break every bone in his body!"

As always during AUNTIE MAME, the Beekman Place apartment undergoes interior decoration changes to match each of Mame's personas, as well as the zeitgeist of the decade. Art Director Malcolm C. Bert with Set Decorator George James Hopkins created an apartment that achieves the status of being a character in and of itself, within the movie - a perfectly-deserved promotion of a living space, to a character, in an almost perfect, flawless movie.

"Live, live, LIVE! Life's a banquet and most poor suckers are starving to death!" ~Mame Dennis in AUNTIE MAME

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