Rating: 
Summary: Very Entertaining
Review: A delightful movie with great performances by both Monroe and Olivier. Funny love story.
Rating: 
Summary: ONE OF MY ALL TIME FAVORITE MOVIES EVER!
Review: Anyone who has any doubt that Marilyn Monroe could act must see this movie. She absolutely out does Laurence Olivier! She is so funny and charming, and her timing is impeccable. The movie is very funny and romantic, and Sybil Thorndyke is also wonderfully funny. A MUST SEE!
Rating:
Summary: a must for marilyn fans
Review: entertaining, at times a bit slow, movie with Laurence Olivier (who also directed) and Marilyn, of course. Marilyn never looked better, she gives a charming performance. There isn't much chemistry between the principals however, maybe due to Olivier's rigid directing and acting style. Not his best! The long churchscene with the awful music is rediculous. All in all it's pretty good though.
Rating: 
Summary: A Royal Bore!
Review: His Highness Grand Duke Charles, Regent of the Balkan state of Carpathia, with the fake, unintelligible accent (Laurence Olivier) meets Elsie Marina of Wilwaukee (Marilyn Monroe) in what has to be the longest, dullest 1 1/2, 2, 3 hours I have spent watching a movie in a very long time. He may have been the best actor of his generation, but you would be hard pressed to prove it from Olivier's performance here. Monroe, of course, plays the role she was usually assigned, the sexy dumb blonde.I suppose Olivier should get most of the blame for this fiasco since he directed the movie in addition to starring in it. In Olivier's defense, however, I recall that he wanted his wife Vivian Leigh to play the role of Elsie rather than Ms. Monroe. Of course Ms. Monroe could have turned the offer to play Elsie down. There are occasionally mildly funny scenes in the movie, but they are few and far between. After all a comedy should be funny. Oh, 3/4 of the way through the movie, Elsie breaks out into song! Do I need to say more? Both these actors made many good movies. This is not one of them.
Rating:
Summary: A Most Unlikely Pair, but it's Magic!
Review: I first saw this movie years ago, very late or early on a New Year's Eve. I staid glued to the set watching the relationship between these two develop. Marilyn Monroe is so young and charming and funny. Laurence Olivier was already a very established actor. It surprised me to see him in this film, but as usual he pulled it off. I have looked for a copy of this film for a long time. It's a little known jewel in both Olivier's and Monroe's carreers. It's worth seeing.
Rating:
Summary: Monroe at her peak
Review: I gave this film four stars--each for Monroe, who is at her dazzling comedic best here. The film itself is a slow period piece, lanquidly directed by Laurence Olivier, but MM breathes exuberant life into her every onscreen moment. Playing a character with some smarts and savvy, given wittier lines than usual, Monore simply walks away with the film. She is a vigorous American showgirl--healthy, vital, nobody's fool. If anyone possibly doubts MOnroe's ability to create character, compare this vital delectable performance with the weary, worn-out Cherie of "Bus Stop" filmed just months before. Both performances reveal facets of Monroe's talent she was never allowed to use again--not even in "Some Like It Hot." Dame Sybil Thorndike, playing Olivier's mother-in-law steals scenes from Monroe AND Sir Laurence! The coronation sequence is deadly dull and the ending--Monroe's rapid about face--is silly. But the film lives for her delicious high-spirits and wit.
Two other points--Monroe wears the most unforgiving gown of her career, a white number that she never takes off, which rather cuts down on much-needed visual variety. And the voice that she uses in the brief musical interlude is indeed hers; she has simply pitched it to a MUCH higher key! This is not as appealing as her her usual singing style, but appropriate for the period.
"The Prince and The Showgirl" is not Monroe's most famous role, but it is one of her greatest performances. And that she was able to create something that appears so effortless at a time of tremendous personal crisis (she miscarried during the film) stands as a testament to her oft-maligned professionalism.
Rating:
Summary: One reason to watch it
Review: I have two complaints about this film. (1) The special effects used for the coronation parade are very bad; and (2) the song Marilyn sings is very poor (but thankfully brief). However, there is one overwhelming reason to take this film to heart. I have 17 films in which Marilyn Monroe appears or stars, and I can say with certainty that in this one, she is her most radiant, most charming, and most beautiful. And because this is her "happiest" film, she giggles, and she laughs, and it's marvelous! My favorite film will always be "Gentlemen Prefer Blondes," and I think Marilyn's best acting is in "The Misfits." But in "The Prince and the Showgirl," I see Marilyn Monroe as the gorgeous American Icon we all love and cherish. Although the movie is not all that good, it showcases the Ultimate Marilyn. For her, and for her alone, I must give this film 4 stars.
Rating: 
Summary: So Boring!! I would rather have been at the dentist
Review: I love Marilyn and she was beautiful and charming as ever in this, but that could not save it. This never should have been made. I was asleep within the first fifteen minutes. I painfully forced myself to watch it out of respect for Marilyn. It was a very very painful and probably one of the longest two hours of my life. Showgirl meets rude Prince. They fall in love? When did this happen? I never saw any indication of this in the film. I also could not for the life of me see why she would want such a rude person! The movie takes place mainly in one room of the Prince's manor. I will probably have nightmares of that room for the next year! You have been warned! View at your own discretion!
Rating:
Summary: The Prince... The Showgirl... The Calamity.
Review: I rate this the most un-interesting of all of Marilyns roles. As a devoted & lifelong M.M. fan, this is the only one of her films that I've only gotten through twice. The first time, just to see it, the second time, to see if I was possibly mistaken in my negative appraisal of it. I wasn't. While Marilyn is certainly at her most etherally beautiful, this film was destined for failure from the beginning. The notorious pairing of Monroe with Laurence Olivier was a mis-calculation from its inception. It is obvious that Olivier needed a "commercial" hit movie at that point in his career, and, while his wife, Vivien Leigh, had originated the role of Elsie Marina on stage, Marilyn Monroe Productions bought the rights to "The Sleeping Prince", its original title. Also, Marilyn at that time was a highly commercial draw, and her name with Oliviers would be more of a guarantee of box office dollars (they thought.) It soon became obvious what everyone suspected, that Olivier did not respect and was secretly humiliated by a co-starring role with Americas notorious sex symbol. Also, it was reported that, because this was being produced by M.M. Productions, she was literally in an "in- charge" position, which equally humiliated him. In "The Noel Coward Diaries", Noel Coward, a good friend of Oliviers, expressed the general snobbish opinion when he writes, in the year 1956, that starring with Monroe was a humiliating but commercially necessary decision for Olivier, and "to hell with eminence", a barely disguised aspersion on Marilyn. Her arrival in England was met with an immediate press conference, where she was condescendingly queried as to what her favorite Beethoven numbers were, and, how long did she think a whale could stay under water ??, the implications being obvious. To add to all the pressure and high expectations of such a pairing, M.M. had recently wed Arthur Miller, immersing her in a highly intellectual world, where the insecure Marilyn, though naturally bright and intuitive, was ill equipped to always hold her own. The fact that Olivier was also hired by Marilyn to direct this film didn't help, and his comment to Marilyn near the beginning of the shoot, "Okay, Marilyn..Be sexy!", was an obvious assumption as to where Olivier thought Marilyns only true talent lie, and only served to undermine her already shaky confidence. The "most exciting combination since black and white !", as Joshua Logan deemed this collaboration , went from bad to worse, with Olivier detesting Marilyns growing insecurities, and what he viewed as her unprofessionalism. He also hated "The Method", the acting style which M.M. had been influenced by in her continuing studies at The Actors Studio. By the time this film wrapped, everyone involved was barely on speaking terms, and Marilyns exit from England was the opposite of the fan fare she confronted upon her arrival. The movie was almost universally panned upon release, with many noting the obvious lack of chemistry between the principals. Oddly enough, Olivier was surprised with a screening of this film , many years after its filming, and Marilyns death, as a joke by friends of his. They were all surprisingly unaminous in their appraisal after its viewing, as Olivier wrote: "Everyone was clamorous in their praises, I was as good as could be...and Marilyn! Marilyn was quite wonderful, the best of all. So...what do you know ?" Be that as it may, I still rate this the least interesting of her roles... she was not respected before her arrival to film this movie, or in the environment created around her during its filming, and it shows. It does no service, I feel, to her brilliant career, except as a further visual testament to her beauty. Even that is not enough for me to sit through this laborious mistake again. To see M.M. at her magical best, watch "Bus Stop", "Some Like It Hot", or "The Misfits."
Rating:
Summary: So Boring!! I would rather have been at the dentist
Review: I thought "The Prince & The Show Girl," (DVD) was about as good as it gets with MM. A fun tale of opposites attracting. Monroe in one of her finer films.
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