The Beautician and the Beast
| The Beautician and the Beast | |
|---|---|
The one-sheet promotional poster for film.
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| Directed by | Ken Kwapis |
| Produced by |
Todd Graff Hawk Koch Roger Birnbaum Fran Drescher Peter Marc Jacobson |
| Written by | Todd Graff |
| Starring | |
| Music by | Cliff Eidelman |
| Cinematography | Peter Lyons Collister |
| Edited by | Jon Poll |
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Production
company |
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| Distributed by | Paramount Pictures |
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Release date
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February 7, 1997 |
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Running time
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105 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $16 million |
| Box office | $11.5 million |
The Beautician and the Beast is a 1997 American comedy film directed by Ken Kwapis and starring Fran Drescher and Timothy Dalton as the title characters. The story follows the misadventures of a New York City beautician who is mistakenly hired as the school teacher for the children of the president of a small Eastern European country. The story is similar to that of The King and I, The Sound of Music, and Evita, with elements also reminiscent of the sitcom The Nanny, for which Drescher is most famous.
An American beautician named Joy Miller (Fran Drescher) teaches students to groom hair, but is put out of business when one of her students accidentally ignites hair spray with his cigarette, eventually leading to the school burning down. Joy ends up being highlighted in a newspaper article after she helps her students and the caged animals escape the building successfully.
The article is seen by Ira Grushinsky (Ian McNeice), a diplomatic representative of a small Eastern European country called Slovetzia (bordered by Hungary, Romania, and Ukraine), a country she never heard of. Ira has been sent to the United States to find a tutor for the three children of Slovetzia's President, and, mistakenly thinking that Joy is an academic teacher, offers the job to her. Joy accepts, and it is only after they arrive in Slovetzia that Ira realizes his error. By then it is too late, and Joy agrees to keep up the ruse of being a "real" teacher for the time being.
The initial meeting of Joy with the President, a dictator named Boris Pochenko (Timothy Dalton), gets off on the wrong foot, but Joy gets along well with his four children Yuri, Katrina (Lisa Jakub), Karl (Adam LaVorgna), and Masha (Heather DeLoach). Joy teaches them of life outside Slovetzia and helps them gain confidence in themselves. Joy frequently clashes with Pochenko, who is disturbed by her fierce independence and the fact that he cannot frighten her.
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